Artist Cheryl Hodges has had work stolen countless times online, and she is on a mission to end the theft

For 16 years, Cheryl Hodges has seen her botanical illustration of a golden wattle flower spread across the internet without her permission.

She has seen it “innocently” used in environmental brochures, and copied by other artists “for their own gain, selling it as their own on their websites”.

But Ms Hodges said all of those instances were theft.

“Just because you find this image on the internet does not mean you have any right to copy it for any purpose whatsoever,” Ms Hodges said in a social media post.