Short answer. Yes. Article 722 of the Civil Code is explicit: the painter, sculptor, or other artist has dominion over the product of their art even before it is copyrighted. Registration or formal copyright is not a condition for ownership — the artwork belongs to the artist from the moment of creation.
What the law says
The painter, sculptor or other artist shall have dominion over the product of his art even before it is copyrighted.
Civil Code, Article 722 — Rights Before Publication Or Patent. Read the full provision →
Ownership does not wait for registration
Many creators mistakenly believe they need to register a work or formally obtain a copyright before they own it. Article 722 corrects that assumption. For painters, sculptors, and other visual artists, the Civil Code grants dominion over the work the moment it is created — before any registration, before any copyright application, before any publication or sale. The work is yours as soon as you make it. This is consistent with the broader international principle that copyright attaches upon creation, not upon registration.
What "dominion" means
Dominion is the Civil Code's term for full ownership — the right to use, enjoy, dispose of, and exclude others from the property. For a piece of artwork, dominion means you can sell it, display it, destroy it, donate it, or keep it. It is yours in every sense the law recognizes. Note, however, that physical ownership and intellectual property rights are distinct. When you sell a painting, you typically transfer physical ownership but not necessarily the copyright to reproduce it — those may need to be separately transferred depending on the terms of the sale.
What happens after copyright registration
Article 722 also addresses the next step: once a work is copyrighted (or, for authors and composers, once published), the relevant intellectual property statute governs the rights. In the Philippines, that is the Intellectual Property Code (Republic Act 8293). Under that law, copyright protection for artistic works is extensive and also attaches at creation, not at registration. Formal registration provides evidentiary advantages but is not the source of the right itself. Article 722's role is to confirm that the Civil Code's concept of property ownership covers creative works even in that pre-registration period.
Practical consequences
If someone takes your artwork, displays it without permission, or sells copies of it before you have formally registered a copyright, you still have legal grounds to object. Your ownership under Article 722 is not a lesser right because no registration certificate has been issued. That said, enforcing your rights in practice — particularly proving authorship and the date of creation — is easier if you have documentation. Keeping records of your creative process, dated photographs of works in progress, or original files with metadata can matter enormously when a dispute arises.