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.
If I hire a stand at an Art Fair to sell my own artwork, what can I do if the event is cancelled?
You need to check the hire contract for your contractual rights. The company will be in breach…
Riding the D-Train (part 1)
Because of the unique nature of every practitioner’s financial circumstances, it has seemed impossible over the past nine years to address, in a meaningful way in this column, one vital issue. My failure to do…
Dear landlord, please don’t put a price on my soul
It happened to artists in New York and Chicago in the sixties, and it’s beginning to happen in London today. Artists seek out and find low cost studio space in…
Collaborations
If two or more artists collaborate on a work of art, which one of them will own the copyright of the finished work? What if there has been a creative partnership between two artists and one of them wishes…
Stamp of Approval
The Stamp Art and Postal History of Michael Thompson and Michael Hernandez de Luna was recently published in the US and makes fascinating reading. The authors are mail artists, who teamed up in 1994 to pursue their…
First Semester Report
On February 14, 2006, the UK Artists’ Resale Right (ARR) came into operation, after a year long media campaign on behalf of UK art market professionals opposing its introduction, and a media campaign led by the Design…
What is the difference between a work/live and a live/work space?
There is an important difference between work/live and live/work spaces due to the planning requirements of local planning authorities. In work/live spaces the emphasis is on the space being…
Private Commissions and the Law, part 1
The thirteenth year of these columns starts with a re examination of one of the first and most fundamental areas of art practice, private commissions, because it has posed perennial problems, for artists…
Frequently asked questions
Since 2003, Artquest has been helping artists with their legal problems via our Artlaw service. Individual artists living and working in England can send us a legal query, which we pass to our arts legal specialists Henry…
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…
Monumental Manoeuvres in the Dark
The destruction of a sculpture the Government specifically commissioned and permanently installed on a national site is one of the more outrageous of the issues raised recently. I don’t care How many letters they sent…
What legal issues should I be aware of if I want to include cartoons in my work?
Animation and film companies will generally fiercely guard against unauthorized use of their intellectual property such as images of cartoon characters, particularly when these…
What legal issues surround the use of legal tender, i.e. notes and coins, in my artwork?
There are specific rules and criminal penalties for the misuse of monetary notes and coinage, and you should refer to the Royal Mint’s own…
The Values of Insurance
Valuing artworks for any purpose can be a headache. Firstly, there is what might be termed intrinsic value – many hours can be enjoyed arguing on an intellectual basis, but there is no universally applicable magic…
The Artists’ Campaign for Droit de Suite
On 17 May 1993 a unique and important meeting was held to give artists the chance to hear about droit de suite (the visual artist’s resale royalty right) and form their own views…
Self-Expression and the Law
On Tuesday 25 October 1977 Kerry Trengove was sealed inside a 15ft x 10ft breeze block bunker on the ground floor of the Acme Gallery in Covent Garden. He then dug a 3ft sq. hole to…
Art Law Introduction
Visual artists, like any other members of the community, are subject to the ordinary laws of the land, but many are often unaware of the significant role the law plays in their working lives. Major problems are…
International Artlaw Research and Education Fund
This month, the International Bar Association Conference at Cannes will review the work carried out to date by its ‘Educational Trust Cultural Property Law and Research and Educational Project’. In other words, its Artlaw…