Copyright Law

Breaking News

Posted on January 19, 2010
The AAMD agrees with itself.Well, that settles it.

More on the Fresno Museum Closing

Posted on January 17, 2010
I've been meaning to mention this interesting story in the LA Times on the closing of the Fresno Metropolitan Museum.First, the story confirms that the museum's entire art collection will now "be sold at auction."So we've got a real-life reminder that if we're unwilling to let a financially-troubled museum sell one or two works, the result may well be that it ends up having to sell all its works...

Perhaps they should try a bake sale instead

Posted on January 17, 2010
According to The St. Petersburg Times, the Salvador Dali Museum needs $6 million to complete construction on a new building. The president of the museum's board says they "will be forced to take out loans using art from the Dali collection as collateral if the tax dollars or new contributions don't come through soon...

Linkage

Posted on January 17, 2010
Two-year federal prison sentence for attempting to sell stolen artworks.Duveen was right! (Related post here.)Lindsay Pollock on the rise of third-party guarantees.Leibovitz-Lavazza suit settled.How the Brooklyn Museum is putting its collection online.

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Update on the Brodsky Bill

Posted on January 14, 2010
The NYT's Robin Pogrebin reports on "a round-table meeting [this morning] billed as the first discussion of deaccessioning among state policymakers and museum professionals in a public setting." Brodsky's aim seems to be to "to make sure that we do not, in a crisis, see a massive privatization of art" -- so let me again just point out that the Ellis Rule would accomplish the same thing...

"They didn't fit the theme of the current installation"

Posted on January 13, 2010
ARTINFO.com: "The New York Post reports that the Metropolitan Museum of Art has pulled images of the Prophet Mohammed from its galleries devoted to Islamic art and suggests that the move is the latest chapter in the museum?s 'history of dodging criticism...

Linkage

Posted on January 13, 2010
Update on the Hotel Drouot investigation."A 19th-century Impressionist artwork stolen off the wall of a French museum nearly three decades ago is going back to the scene of the crime.""A Claude Monet painting stolen in 2000 from a museum in western Poland has been recovered...

More on the Dobrzynski Proposal

Posted on January 12, 2010
Speaking of sensible reform proposals, there've been a number of interesting follow-ups to Judith Dobrzynski's deaccessioning op-ed in the NYT.First, there were several letters to the editor in response, including one from the president and CEO of the J...

"Does it make sense to keep a large percentage of a museum?s art assets in storage, never to be seen, when the same museum is laying off curators?"

Posted on January 12, 2010
Andras Szanto has a long, interesting piece in The Art Newspaper on the situation facing US museums. The whole thing is worth reading, but, for obvious reasons, I found the following particularly interesting:"According to current guidelines, museums can only sell art to buy other art, not to cover operations...

Works for me

Posted on January 11, 2010
The other day, I wondered about Richard Feigen's reference to "unrestricted paintings" at the Barnes. In response, Lee Rosenbaum emails a link to her 2004 NYT Barnes op-ed, which includes the following:"[T]here are a number of steps the Barnes can take to make it possible to survive financially in Merion...

"The Capital of Art Theft, Part 2"

Posted on January 11, 2010
The Art Market Monitor: "France?s density of museums, churches and private homes filled with art make it a cornucopia for crimes of opportunity, elaborate thefts and more nefarious activities."Derek Fincham adds some thoughts: "What happens to these stolen works? The mundane objects are stored until they can be sold later...

Linkage

Posted on January 11, 2010
The Andrew Lloyd Webber Picasso lawsuit has settled. Terms not disclosed. Background posts here and here."A former public-relations consultant for the African American Museum in Philadelphia is suing its president for slander.""Kahlo 'fakes' flood into Mexico...

Tell me again about the "public trust" (a continuing series)

Posted on January 09, 2010
Carol Vogel's "Inside Art" column in today's New York Times is headlined: In Los Angeles, an Urge to Purge. It begins:"For two years the Los Angeles County Museum of Art has been quietly buying paintings and publicly selling them. Readers of Sotheby?s latest auction catalog may have noticed a group of old master paintings coming up for sale on Jan...

"The move is not a 'theft' in any sense of the word but, instead, the legitimate result of a legal proces"

Posted on January 09, 2010
The General Counsel of the Barnes responds to Richard Feigen's piece in the Art Newspaper, which I discussed a couple days ago here.

Estate Tax Changes

Posted on January 08, 2010
In my holiday weekend roundup earlier this week, I mentioned the "temporarily disappearing estate tax." On that topic, below is an advisory we are sending out to clients this week:As you may have seen in the popular press, Congress adjourned last month without definitively addressing the transfer tax provisions of the Economic Growth and Tax Relief Reconciliation Act of 2001 applicable to years 2010 and beyond...

More case of the decade nominees

Posted on January 08, 2010
I linked the other day to Sergio Muñoz Sarmiento's post on the art law case of the decade. Daniel Grant, author of The Business of Being an Artist, emails his choices:"My votes would be for the [Phillips] case in Boston, which goes to the heart of what is site-specific and whether or not the law covers that art world term, and the Daniel Moore case in Alabama, which may turn back a growing effort on the part of numerous colleges to claim anything associated with them as trademarked...

"Yesterday's hearing, widely seen as a formality, was attended by perhaps two dozen quiet members of the public"

Posted on January 07, 2010
The Philadelphia Inquirer's Stephan Salisbury reports that "the Philadelphia Art Commission gave final approval yesterday to plans for the new Barnes Foundation gallery, clearing the way for the renowned collection of early modernist art to move from Merion to the Parkway in 2012 after years of impassioned controversy...

Latest in the Park West Saga

Posted on January 07, 2010
From the Art Newspaper here. Some background here.

"We?re not saying President Obama endorses Weatherproof apparel"

Posted on January 07, 2010
Rebecca Tushnet flags a NYT piece on a garment company that has "installed a billboard in Times Square ... showing President Obama wearing one of its coats" and notes: "Obama might be the only prominent celebrity so unlikely to act against this type of use of his image that the publicity isn't accompanied by substantial risk...

What do you do if someone steals your idea?

Posted on January 07, 2010
Sergio Muñoz Sarmiento is thinking about the question. As a very modest contribution to the conversation, I'll just point out that copyright does not protect ideas.

"Zabrin admitted conducting 280 sales of fraudulent art on eBay "

Posted on January 06, 2010
The AP: "A suburban Chicago man pleaded guilty Tuesday to swindling at least 250 people out of more than $1 million through the sale of counterfeit prints advertised as the work of Pablo Picasso and other major contemporary artists."

Top Art Theft Stories 2009

Posted on January 06, 2010
Plus what to watch for in 2010, from Art Theft Central's Mark Durney.Mark also has some thoughts on Southern France's "rich history of art crime."

"The Fresno Metropolitan Museum closed its doors for good Tuesday, its ambitious dreams crushed by unsustainable financial losses"

Posted on January 06, 2010
The Fresno Bee has the story here.The Deaccessioning Blog: Am I Right? Or Am I Right?I'll just add one quick point regarding the "moral hazard" argument against deaccessioning (which I alluded to Monday). I don't know to what extent, if any, sales of art could have solved the Fresno Museum's problems, but the logic of the "moral hazard" position is that we have to accept the loss of this museum (and, if The Deaccessioning Blog is right, perhaps as many as nine others in the near future) for the greater good of improving museum management generally (the argument being that, by taking the sale option off the table, the people who run our museums will be better motivated to properly manage them and, in the process, save their jobs; they can't just squander their resources and then look to sales of art to bail them out)...

Linkage

Posted on January 05, 2010
Still catching up on all the art law that happened over the long New Year's weekend:Degas work stolen.Art thefts rock France for second time in a week ("reminding the world of both the country's deep store of artistic treasures and lax security").What's the top art law case of the decade?An uncomfortable year for the museum world...

Where were we (again)?

Posted on January 04, 2010
We begin 2010 where we started in 2009 -- with the deaccessioning debate in the pages of the New York Times. Over the holiday weekend, Judith Dobrzynski had an op-ed piece arguing that "de-accessioning shouldn?t be impossible ? just nearly so." She begins by pointing out that "already some respected figures ? David Gordon, former head of the Milwaukee Art Museum, and Richard Armstrong, director of the Solomon R...

Boldly Go

Posted on December 30, 2009
I've been meaning to mention this Appellate Division decision affirming the dismissal of a claim against Christie's by a disappointed buyer of Star Trek memorabilia. You can read some background on the claim here. The buyer was held bound by Christie's Conditions of Sale, which in this case (1) "expressly declared that 'all property is sold as is' without any representation or warranty of any kind by Christie's or the seller" (typically not the case for fine art auctions, which come with a warranty of authenticity) and (2) "contractually precluded" him "from pursuing the massive recovery he now demands" because "the only remedy available to him thereunder would be a refund of the sale price(s) upon return of the item(s), a limitation generally permissible in contracts for the sale of goods" (a limitation which typically does apply in the fine art context)...

Another

Posted on December 29, 2009
The West Valley Art Museum in Arizona has closed.

Reviewing the Years in Review

Posted on December 29, 2009
The year-in-review articles and posts have been trickling in, a number of which touch on art-law related matters. Derek Fincham has the Year in Cultural Policy, including the following on deaccessioning:"One of the difficulties with deaccession stems from its connection to our fundamental view of art and museum governance...

I guess "in storage" is kind of like "in the public trust"

Posted on December 29, 2009
The Claremont Museum of Art has closed.

"[The complaint's] subjects swing from accusations of sex slavery to a detective's allergy to cats"

Posted on December 29, 2009
Greg Allen: Pebble Beach Pollock Case Gives Year-End Burst of Crazy.

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