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.
Disclosure of Buyers
High profile artists rarely speak publicly about the commercial dimensions of their practices. It is significant, then, that a leading British artist, the usually reticent Peter Doig, recently voiced concerns about the way artists can be mistreated…
Dealers/Agents/Advisors: Beware
During summer 2023, a saga began to unfold concerning the art business of a prominent contemporary art market professional, based in New York City. The story raises significant legal and ethical issues for the art ecosystem. Lisa Schiff…
Don’t You Trust Me?
Artists and dealers rarely if ever discuss in public their professional business relationships. Much praise, therefore, is due to London based artist Alvaro Barrington and his gallery dealer Sadie Coles for recently speaking publicly about the…
Secondary Sales Risks
Caveat emptor is usually translated as ‘let the buyer beware’. Its common use in law and business connotes a doctrine that still operates today, especially in the increasingly lucrative market for secondary sales of contemporary art: caveat…
Dealing Differently
In 1976 this column looked at the case of a London based artist who sent work to a New York gallery for exhibition and sale in the US: the works were sold and the gallery sent the artist…
Doing a Deal: Part 1
Selling work is the primary source of income for most commercially successful artists, and is the strongest aspiration of most of those for whom a market place is not established. It is no surprise that…
Ballad of a Widening Wedge
Just because an agreement is in writing, freely signed by the parties, does not necessarily mean its words alone will bind them at law, in whole, in part, or at all. THE FIRST CASE Conservation…
Consignment: Trust
The term commonly used to describe the contractual relationship between artists supplying their works to galleries for exhibition and possible sale is ‘consignment’. In business and legal terms, consignment does not mean selling work to a gallery, rather…
Tracing Work
Listen to me baby Wherever you may be I’m beggin’ over the radio Please come back to me – I’ve got a mind To move on down the line. * Many artists and galleries find great difficulty in…
Gallery Agreements
Artists – grateful for the offer of a ‘gallery deal’ – are understandably reluctant to request the use of a written agreement during negotiations, since this might jeopardise their chances. In this column during the past months, the…
Contracts with Galleries
Artists leave works with galleries under the most flimsy and informal arrangements. Rarely are written agreements used to tell both sides where they stand, and as a result serious problems can and do arise: work is sold…
Doing a Deal: Part 2
Last month’s column explored the basics of UK contract law and good practices for artists and galleries conducting negotiations with a view to arriving at a gallery deal. This month we look in more detail…
Doing a Deal: Part 3
For reasons stated in Part Two (AM214), gallery less dealers are not a generally recommended agent for promotion and sales. However, there are those few who have succeeded in establishing respectable dealerships with reliable collectors,…
Exhibition Agreements
Most public galleries and many private ones put on exhibitions solely for the purpose of making the work of an artist or group of artists available for public view – selling is only incidental; these are usually ‘one…
Agency Deals
The lack of gallery premises or adequate showing space has not prevented many actual or would be dealers approaching artists offering agency deals, with a view to promoting and selling the artists' work and their reputations. In recent…
Bankrupt Galleries: A Cautionary Tale
Art galleries too are not recession proof, but what happens to the stock, the artwork, when they cease trading may be more complicated and certainly is unnerving for the artists involved. Auctions of liquidated stock…
Agents’ and Dealers’ Duties
Leonardo Da Vinci's drawing Madonna and Child with St Anne and a Lamb (c.1501 19) was the subject of a lawsuit decided by London's High Court in November 2010, which shed “a bright light on an…