Orlan, a French visual artist known for her work around plastic surgery and carnal art, has once again had a claim against Lady Gaga for copying her work rejected. The artist first brought her claim to court over the music video for “Born this Way” in 2013 – originally losing that case in 2016, she had put forward another appeal. 

As Artnet News reports, Orlan has been ordered by the French court to pay €10,000 in legal costs to Gaga, as well as a further €6,000 to Universal Music Group. 

The first claim, brought by Orlan who sought $31.7 million, asserted that Gaga copied two of her visual pieces: Bumpload (1989), where Orlan attaches bumpy prosthetics to her face, and Woman with Head (1996), featuring a woman’s decapitated head. Her suit was dismissed in 2016. 

Previously, when the first case came through the courts, Lady Gaga said she did not have any prior knowledge of who Orlan was. 

In her latest appeal from earlier in May, Orlan asserted that Gaga was ‘free-riding’ with her original ideas, receiving no direct reference or compensation. According to Le Journal des Arts, the court ruled that the artworks were totally different mediums, that Orlan and Gaga were not in any competitive league for the case to be relevant, nor had the musician benefited from any association with Orlan. 

Gaga has faced multiple accusations of copying and plagiarism, from Madonna stans to other musicians – in 2011, Chicago-based singer Rebecca Francescatti filed a copyright claim against Gaga for “Judas”. She claimed “substantial portions” of the track were taken from her own song “Juda”. The case was thrown out as the songs were deemed “not substantially similar”, and Gaga sued her right back.

h/t Artnet News