Artists Sue Nike, Converse, Timberland, Nordstrom Over Sculptural Footwear Designs

NORWALK, CT, October 27, 2026 /CourierPR/ -- More than three decades after two immigrant artists began transforming ordinary sneakers and boots into radical sculptural footwear in a tiny Manhattan shoe-repair shop, their fight over who owns that artistic expression has reached federal court. Mark M. Kratter, Boris Zuborev, and Eugene Finkelberg have brought a federal copyright action against Nike, Inc., Converse, Inc., TBL Licensing LLC d/b/a Timberland, and Nordstrom, Inc. in the U.S. District Court for the District of Connecticut. The case, No. 3:26-cv-01804-KAD, was filed on October 16, 2026.

The plaintiffs allege that six sculptural footwear works created beginning in 1992 by Zuborev and Finkelberg at East Village Shoe Repair were later copied and commercialized through footwear sold by major global brands. The defendants have not been adjudicated liable, and the allegations remain to be determined by the court.

The plaintiffs say they intend to seek up to $120 million in actual damages and profits attributable to any proven infringement, subject to discovery, proof, and the remedies permitted by law. The case contains an unusual twist: the plaintiffs allege that Converse had direct knowledge of the creative world from which these designs emerged.

East Village Shoe Repair began in Manhattan in 1992. The creators' Copyright Office submission describes Zuborev as having attended art school in Belarus and Finkelberg as having trained at a shoemaker school in Russia before the two established East Village Shoe Repair and began experimentally transforming mass-produced footwear.

The six works now at the center of the federal lawsuit include a moccasin-sneaker hybrid; a sneaker featuring an elevated, sculpturally treated sole; a sneaker combining a central zipper with nonfunctional faux eyelets; a faux-fur sneaker; an elongated knee/thigh-high sneaker-boot with ornamental faux lacing and zipper entry; and a transformed high-heel work boot.

The plaintiffs are not claiming ownership of ordinary sneakers, boots, zippers, laces, fur, heels, or other commonplace footwear elements standing alone. Their complaint claims copyright protection in original sculptural expression created through the particular selection, coordination, arrangement, proportions, ornamentation, textures, contours, and visual relationships embodied in the completed works.

In 2018, i-D reported on a MadeMe and Converse project featuring Zuborev operating behind a shoe-repair counter at a pop-up. The article described Zuborev's association with East Village Shoe Repair and the shop's history in New York's club scene. PAPER Magazine also reported in 2018 that Converse had enlisted Zuborev in connection with the MadeMe collaboration, describing Zuborev as the creator of giant platform shoes associated with New York's 1990s club scene.

That history gives the lawsuit's allegations of access an unusual backdrop. The First Amended Complaint additionally alleges that, before the later Martine Ali x Converse release, designer Martine Ali personally visited Zuborev at the Bushwick studio, allegedly providing direct access to the elongated sneaker-boot identified in the litigation as Work 5. That allegation has not yet been adjudicated.

The plaintiffs' claims are allegations. No court has determined that Nike, Converse, Timberland, or Nordstrom infringed the plaintiffs' asserted copyrights, and the defendants are entitled to contest the allegations.

Before bringing the present infringement action, the artists sought copyright registration for the six sculptural footwear works. Their Second Request for Reconsideration, dated October 27, 2025, argues that the works possess original and conceptually separable sculptural expression and contains extensive photographic and documentary material concerning the six works.

The First Amended Complaint alleges that the Copyright Office maintained its refusal to register the works and that the plaintiffs dispute the Office's originality determination. The complaint now asks the federal court for, among other things, a declaration that the claimed sculptural expression is original and copyrightable and that the plaintiffs own copyrights in the works.

The plaintiffs' claims are part of a broader debate over the protection of artistic expression in the fashion industry. The case raises questions about the extent to which independent artists can protect their work from being commercialized by multinational companies without compensation.