Coming to an Auction House Near You? The Revived Debate Over Art Resale Royalties

While owners of works in the U.S. enjoy a broad right of first sale, in much of the world, artists or their heirs are entitled to royalties when previously sold works of fine art are resold.  In the EU, a resale royalty system is in the process of being enacted in the member states, while a recently struck-down resale royalty law in California is being considered in the Ninth Circuit and new legislation has been introduced to federalize resale royalties for fine art.  Join Representative Jerry Nadler (D-NY), the top-ranking democrat on the House Subcommittee on Courts, Intellectual Property and the Internet, along with our panel of art law experts, for a presentation and discussion on the laws and policies surrounding resale royalties and what may lie ahead for resale royalty legislation.

Please join us over lunch for a presentation by Representative Nadler followed by a panel discussion.

Theodore “Ted” Feder received his Ph.D. from the Department of Art History and Archaeology at Columbia University, where he also taught the subject. He started Art Resource while still a graduate student, and later founded Artists Rights Society (ARS ) at the behest of the then two French quasi-govenmental artists rights organizations, ADAGP and SPADEM.

ARS now represents more than 65,000 artists worldwide. Its repertory includes such prominent names as Pablo Picasso, Henri Matisse, Jackson Pollack, Willem de Kooning and Georgia O’Keefe, but also thousands of lesser known artists who journey at their craft in unsung ways. Ted has published extensively in art history, Biblical archaeology, comparative literature, and intellectual property.

Stefan Mentzer is a partner at White & Case in New York. Stefan litigates complex civil matters for a range of clients, including media, technology, ecommerce, retail, and pharmaceutical companies. He has practiced in federal and state trial and appellate courts and in proceedings before the U.S. International Trade Commission, the U.S. Copyright Office, and the Patent and Trademark Office.

Stefan’s areas of focus include copyright, trademark, unfair competition, and music licensing, and he regularly advises clients on strategies for managing IP-related risks.

Congressman Jerrold “Jerry” Nadler represents the Tenth Congressional District of New York, which includes much of the West Side of Manhattan, the Financial District and a number of diverse neighborhoods in southwestern Brooklyn. He began his political career in 1976 in the New York State Assembly, where he served for 16 years, then joined the U.S. House of Representatives in 1992, where he has served ever since.  Rep. Nadler has served as the either Ranking Member or Chair of what is now the House Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution and Civil Justice since 2001. In 2014 Rep. Nadler changed leadership roles to become the Ranking Democrat on the Subcommittee on Courts, Intellectual Property and the Internet. Rep. Nadler is a graduate of Crown Heights Yeshiva, Stuyvesant High School, Columbia University and Fordham Law School. He lives on the West Side of Manhattan with his wife, Joyce Miller.  They have one son, Michael.

Judith B. Prowda (Moderator) is an attorney, mediator and arbitrator focused on art law, copyright, entertainment and commercial law.  She is Senior Lecturer at Sotheby’s Institute of Art, where she teaches graduate courses in Art Law and Ethics and Policy in the Art Profession. Judith is a founding member of Stropheus Art Law, New York’s pioneers in the provision of unbundled legal and business services to artists, gallerists, collectors and museums.  Her publications include Visual Arts and the Law: A Handbook for Professionals (Lund Humphries 2013), The Perils of Selling Art at an Art Fair: Legal Issues in Title, Chapter in Art, Cultural Heritage and the Market: Ethical and Legal Issues (Springer 2014) and The Art of Mediating Art Disputes: A Case for Mediation, Chapter in Appraising Art: The Definitive Guide to Appraising Fine and Decorative Arts (Appraisers Association of America 2013). Judith received her JD from Fordham University School of Law and her LLM from New York University School of Law. She is a graduate of Sarah Lawrence College, Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies, Middlebury College, and l’Institut d’Etudes Politiques, Paris. Prior to studying law, she was a reporter in the World Section at Time magazine and French-English interpreter at the U.S. Department of State.

The Copyright Society of the USA is a New York State CLE Approved Provider. This course will provide 1 CLE credit.

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