On Public Domain Day 2026, works from 1930 entered the U.S. public domain, including art by Piet Mondrian, Paul Klee, José Clemente Orozco, and Sophie Taeuber-Arp. Notable artworks now free to use include Mondrian's *Composition With Red, Blue, and Yellow*, Klee's *Tierfreundschaft*, Orozco's *Prometheus*, and Taeuber-Arp's *Composition of Circles and Overlapping Angles*, as well as pieces by Philip Guston, Marc Chagall, and Edward Hopper from the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Literary works like Sigmund Freud's *Civilization and Its Discontents* and William Faulkner's *As I Lay Dying*, films such as *All Quiet on the Western Front*, and musical compositions including "Dream a Little Dream of Me" and "Georgia on My Mind" also entered the public domain, along with the original Betty Boop character and early *Blondie* comics.
This annual event, celebrated since 2019 after a 21-year freeze due to the Sonny Bono Copyright Extension Act, matters because it enriches the cultural commons, allowing artists, educators, and the public to freely reproduce, remix, and build upon foundational works of modern culture. The expiration of copyright on these works also highlights ongoing global disparities in copyright terms, as different countries have varying protections—70 years after death in the EU and UK, 50 years in much of Asia and Africa—affecting which works enter the public domain where.