Archive of Henry Lydiate‘s Artlaw column, published in Art Monthly since 1976. Have a legal question about your career? Check our Directory or send us a legal query.
Copyrightability
Many governments worldwide are currently seeking to keep pace with the impact – on their economies, infrastructures and industries – of AI developments and innovations. In the visual art ecosystem, two challenging issues are being faced: whether AI generated…
Changes to Permitted Uses
Changes to copyright law came into force in the UK on 1 June 2014, and implement policies developed by the EU aimed at facilitating use of creative works in the post digital age. UK’s Copyright, Designs…
Theft, Lies & Videotape
It is trite, but true, to say that the marketplace has become global in its scope and access has become virtually instant. The visual art marketplace now shares many more common technological features with, say, the…
Recording Visiting Speakers
This piece considers key legal and ethical issues involved. Copyright in speech is the first issue. Copyright is an economic right, lasting for the lifetime of an author plus 70 years after the end of the year…
Art Online
Many myths abound, and there is much ignorance and misunderstanding about the use of images online and the sale of works using e commerce. What are the key issues involved, is there any legal protection and have any…
Technology vs Copyright
May 1994 sees the launch of the Crafts Council Picture Bank – the first publicly accessible computer library of contemporary craftwork. Visitors will be able to walk into the Crafts Council, sit down at one of the…
Virtual Collections: National Portrait Gallery versus Wikipedia
The digital revolution’s radical transformation of information and communications technology has enabled public and private collections throughout the world to offer instant internet access to images of countless numbers of their artworks: virtual…
Online Sales
Banksy has become the target of a print fraud, it was exclusively revealed by The Art Newspaper (October 2007): ‘unauthorised works by the anonymous graffiti artist have been sold on the internet; prices for these have been illegally…
Digital Archives
Archiving artists’ works and related material has been greatly facilitated in recent years by significant advances in digital technology, which has stimulated museums and galleries to consider not only digitally archiving material in their collections, but also its…