Copyright Law

A Little Light

Posted on June 07, 2010
The LA Times: "One of Thomas Kinkade's companies filed for bankruptcy protection Wednesday, a day after a $1-million payment was due to former gallery owners who have tried for four years to collect on a judgment they won against the self-styled 'painter of light...

Minor Problem

Posted on June 05, 2010
NY Post: "Fallen Internet tycoon Halsey Minor is so hard up for cash that he can't even afford to send Sotheby's his art collection to make good on his $6.6 million debt to the famed auction house. Court papers filed yesterday say the CNet.com co-founder 'has represented that he cannot pay shippers to transport his fine and decorative art as directed...

"Exploring this option is a reasonable way to preserve the financially strapped school?s collection"

Posted on June 05, 2010
The Boston Globe editorial board on Brandeis's plans to raise some money by lending out artworks:"Because the economics of maintaining a museum can be forbidding, Brandeis deserves praise, not criticism, for trying to raise revenue through its collection...

Minor Update

Posted on June 03, 2010
NY Post: "A judge yesterday told cash-strapped Internet tycoon Halsey Minor to cough up his cars, jewelry, and even the rugs on his floor to pay off a $6.6 million debt to Sotheby's."

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"In short, I think the case is far from over, even if many others are reporting otherwise."

Posted on June 02, 2010
Peter Friedman, keeping Hope alive.

"The incredible amounts of money paid for canvases, matched with the lax security at many museums around the world, makes art theft, really, a given."

Posted on June 02, 2010
NPR interviews Ulrich Boser.

Linkage

Posted on June 01, 2010
What are we paying for when we pay for art?When is a copyright "registered" such that an infringement claim can be filed? Related post here.Dealers in Australia not so happy about new resale royalty law.

"Because Banksy trespassed on private property and then abandoned his work, the painting belongs to whoever owns the [property]"

Posted on June 01, 2010
"But it's not that simple."

Rose News

Posted on May 31, 2010
The other story I didn't get to before the long weekend was Geoff Edgers's report in the Boston Globe that Brandeis "plans to hire Sotheby?s auction house as a broker to raise money by loaning out artworks."As Edgers points out, this is nothing new:"In the 1990s, the Whitney Museum of American Art was paid $4...

"Whether it?s sooner or later, The Associated Press is going to win"

Posted on May 31, 2010
That's a quote from Alvin Hellerstein, the judge in the Shepard Fairey-AP lawsuit, that I meant to mention before the holiday weekend.

"That's at least debatable, but the film has little interest in debate"

Posted on May 28, 2010
The Art of the Steal is still making its way around the country. Here's a recent review from The Columbus Dispatch:"Yet it's hard to get worked up over The Art of the Steal. ... Ultimately, the art isn't disappearing; it's being moved a short distance away...

A Moveable Feast

Posted on May 28, 2010
The Art Market Monitor points to a "learned, perceptive and moving" essay by Lance Esplund in The Weekly Standard on the Barnes move. Esplund describes at great length the special-ness of the Barnes, but, as the Monitor points out, he "seems to ignore one central feature of the debate...

"The important thing is just that the artwork is accessible. It's not about legal or illegal. It's not better if it's illegal."

Posted on May 28, 2010
An interview with Shepard Fairey in The Atlantic.

Linkage

Posted on May 27, 2010
Another art theft in France.Art theft in Rhode Island.Art theft in Kate Moss's house.What makes an art thief tick?Are museums safer in Washington?Salander update.Help for nonprofits that missed the May 17 filing deadline.Which institution will be the first to offer a joint MFA/MBA/JD?Update on Fresno Art Museum...

More on the Paris Art Theft

Posted on May 26, 2010
There's been lots of coverage of the big art theft from a Paris museum last week. Derek Fincham collects some of it here. Some of the more interesting commentary, there and elsewhere:ARCA's Noah Charney tells Time: "The theft has all the markings of organized crime, which, since the 1960s, has been responsible for most art crime worldwide...

Minor Victory

Posted on May 24, 2010
Score one for collector Halsey Minor:"Halsey Minor won a victory in his tangled dispute with Christie's ... on Friday when a San Francisco jury found that the auction house had waited too long to return some of Mr. Minor's art after failing to sell the art on his behalf...

"As the facts of this case make clear, some in the art world desire a market that is neither open nor honest. ..."

Posted on May 21, 2010
". . . Thus, collectors in this seemingly refined bazaar should heed the admonition ?caveat emptor? and be mindful of the Statute of Frauds."Collector Craig Robins's claims against dealer David Zwirner have failed, on statute of frauds grounds. Helen Stoilas and Marisa Mazria Katz have a good summary in The Art Newspaper.

Major Art Theft in Paris

Posted on May 20, 2010
Forbes: "A thief stole five paintings valued at more than $100 million, including major works by Picasso and Matisse, in an overnight heist Thursday at a Paris modern art museum with a broken alarm system."New York magazine: "The Museum of Modern Art in Paris Should Probably Invest in a Better Alarm System...

"I will assume they tried to contact Christo by calling him on his iPhone, but they got cut off"

Posted on May 20, 2010
Greg Allen: "No Artists Were Paid In The Making Of This Commercial."Related post from a while back here.

"Would you prefer that a public university use its limited funds to educate students or maintain an art collection that?s been dumped upon it?"

Posted on May 20, 2010
The Art Market Monitor on "a new wrinkle to the de-accessioning debate."

Jail Sentence for Dangerous Art

Posted on May 19, 2010
St. Louis Post-Dispatch: "A retired art teacher ... was sentenced to 20 days in jail Monday after he refused to make changes to art pieces in his front yard that the court and city officials have deemed dangerous."Ann Althouse: "And it was political too...

Linkage

Posted on May 19, 2010
Salander works for sale.National Museum of Catholic Art closes.Jersey City Museum still on the brink.Exit prices for museums.

Louis Vuitton Suit Update

Posted on May 18, 2010
There was a decision a couple of weeks ago on Louis Vuitton's motion for summary judgment in Clint Arthur's lawsuit over some prints he bought at a shop that was set up in connection with a Takashi Murakami exhibition at L.A. MOCA in 2008. The case survived, but large chunks of it were knocked out...

Poster Boy Free

Posted on May 17, 2010
On bail. (Background here.)

Hoffman Suit

Posted on May 14, 2010
Bloomberg's Lindsay Pollock reports that "Marguerite Hoffman, a prominent Dallas art collector, filed suit this week against Mexican financier David Martinez for failing to keep her 2007 sale of a star Mark Rothko painting a secret." (The work sold for $31...

Linkage (falling hopelessly behind edition)

Posted on May 14, 2010
FBI arrests three, including a Seattle art dealer, in connection with long-running art theft ring."A glaring problem in our current copyright registration system."Nonprofit doomsday approaches.What does Elena Kagan have against art?A tax deduction for returning Nazi-looted art?The art pawnbroker...

A Deaccessioning Puzzle

Posted on May 14, 2010
An interesting story inside Carol Vogel's "Inside Art" column inside today's New York Times. It seems that MoMA recently bought a 50 percent interest in Matthew Barney's "Drawing Restraint Archive." The other half belongs to the Emanuel Hoffmann Foundation, whose collection is located in Basel...

Tepper Galleries Folds

Posted on May 14, 2010
NYT story here. They face at least one claim already -- from their landlord: "Tepper?s lease still had eight years left when the gallery owners packed their goods into a few trucks, said Myles Schwartz, an executive managing director at Colliers International ...

Minor Sale

Posted on May 14, 2010
Bloomberg's Katya Kazakina and Lindsay Pollock report that a sale last night at Phillips of works from the collection of Halsey Minor "raised $21.1 million to pay his creditors": "Proceeds from the sale ... will go toward a $21.6 million judgment obtained in October by ML Private Finance, a Bank of America affiliate, on a delinquent loan to Minor...

Barnes Update

Posted on May 13, 2010
The Philadelphia Inquirer's Stephan Salisbury reports that things remain on track for the Barnes Foundation's move to downtown Philadelphia. I like his hysteria-free description of what led to the move:"In the 1990s, ... the foundation fell into serious financial difficulties and faced the possibility of closure...

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