The euro has not even been introduced in Croatia yet, but the single currency is already causing the second scandal. At first there was a fight with Serbia about the 50 cent coin, now the design for the 1 euro coin appears to have been plagiarized.
The image of the marten on the reverse of the coin, which won a design competition, is very similar to the one shot by Scotsman Iain Leach of such an animal, the photographer found. “The designer is a thief. He stole my design and took home a prize,” he told news portal Telegram†
Journalists soon learned that Leach’s photo appears as one of the first results of a Google search for the words ‘side view marten’. Telegram Then revealed that designer Stjepan Pranjkovic, who received 10,000 euros for his winning image, asked for advice on photo editing on Facebook in July.
‘Help! Can someone tell me if it is possible to extract a crop of a photo from Photoshop and open it in Illustrator, or maybe in another program to apply lighting effects to it?’ he wrote. “I’m designing some coins.”
Pranjkovic has now withdrawn his version of the marten “due to the negative atmosphere in the media and the pressure”. The Croatian central bank must therefore diligently look for an alternative. The country will display all prices in both euros and the current national currency, kuna, from the summer. That’s the Croatian word for marten.
That is why the authorities also like to print the animal on the euro, but the central bank is now considering going for a completely different image because of the fuss. It is even more embarrassing that it will have to go through the European Commission and the EU countries again. They had already approved the plagiarized design. At the beginning of next year, Croatia hopes to introduce the European currency.
Earlier quarrel with Serbia
The Croatian coins of 10, 20 and 50 cents will definitively show an image of the famous inventor and discoverer of the alternating current Nikola Tesla. Serbia protested against this last year, because Tesla, although born in present-day Croatia, has always identified as a Serb. Croatia ignores that criticism.
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