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.
Tomorrow is a Long Time
Alteration, defacement, mutilation, modification, deterioration and destruction of artworks are matters usually ignored at the outset by artists, their commissioners and/or buyers. In future columns we will look at the conservation concerns of keepers of…
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…
Is there Life after Art School?
The cuts in part time art school teaching is one of the most myopic acts of vandalism ever committed by the establishment in recent years: shortsighted it surely is. The custom of inviting practising…
How can I prevent unauthorised use of images of my work that are published on the Internet?
One practical safeguard is to keep images of your work on the Internet in low resolution, as this generally makes them unsuitable for…
Commissioning an Artist
Commissioning an artist to create a work is one of the earliest forms of art activity and one of the most obvious legal relationships an artist enters into: a commission agreement is a contract by which the…
The Artist’s Resale Right Regulations 2006
On December 15 2005, the final draft of the Artist’s Resale Right Regulations 2006 were placed before parliament by the UK government for approval by resolution of each House of Parliament, with the aim…
Parliamentary Report: The Market for Art
The introduction into UK law from January 2006 of the Artists’ Resale Right saw a flurry of activity and media coverage early in 2005 including newspaper articles, radio programmes, letters to national newspaper editors,…
Originality
Last year’s Turner Prize controversy was pure artlaw territory and deserves closer examination. It concerned one of four short listed artists, Glenn Brown and his large canvas Loves of Shepherds, 2000. Full colour reproductions of the work were splashed…
Global Art Business
This first column of 2008 responds to many readers’ requests to explore key business issues faced by both artists and art business professionals conducting their practices/businesses internationally. The Peoples Republic of China joined the World Trade Organisation…
The Way Forward?
‘Any government, whatever its political line, should take some active steps to encourage the arts. The task of a Minister for the Arts is to help to create and preserve a framework within which the arts can…
Artists Resale Right
Half a dozen pieces over three decades mark the progress of artists' resale royalty right legislation in Europe, California and the UK. A campaign by artists lobbying for the introduction of this economic right in the UK…
Appropriation
On March 5, 2005, in central London two separate events took place: each focused on artlaw and different ways of appropriating the law into the form and content of artists’ works. The first was jointly organised by the Interdisciplinary…
Court Cases
It is unusual for there to be a sufficient number of artlaw cases to report between Issues, but this month there is a wealth of them. Duchamp’s urinals In 1998 a French artist, Pierre Pinoncelli, committed criminal damage…
International Foundation for Art Research: IFAR
The Internet continues to advance and develop the provision of high quality, free access information. IFAR is one such excellent and authoritative resource, for current and historical information about art business throughout the world.…
Nothing is Forever
It seems that the number of artists whose works suffer minor indignities or major censorship at the hands of the powerful will continue to increase until kingdom come. But nothing, as Pat Lally observed, is forever. Pat…
An American in Florence: restoring the moral balance
Professor James Beck, Professor of Art History at Columbia University, prosecuted for the fourth time for criminal libel in an Italian Court, has been acquitted. Restorer Gianni Caponi brought the four actions…