Posted on: April 13, 2018 by Julia Rodrigues Casella Hommes
A few months ago we discussed here the restrictions on the ivory trade in the UK and the changes that were brewing following a wide-reaching public consultation issued by the British government. As a result, the ivory trade in the UK is virtually banned, apart from five stringently-regulated exceptions. Following over 70,000 responses, it is […]
Posted on: March 12, 2018 by Holly Woodhouse
The Australian Financial Review recently reported the collapse of Mossgreen Auction House, which has left the Australian art market reeling and industry insiders calling for reform. The auction house is now being wound down after failed attempts to restructure the company. Founded in 2004 by British-born Paul Sumner, Mossgreen Auction House and Gallery quickly grew to […]
Posted on: February 28, 2018 by Alexander Herman
We were fortunate enough to be able to take the students from the LLM programme in Art, Business and Law to the V&A to hear the museum’s in-house solicitor, Anthony Misquitta, speak about the various legal issues faced by the institution on a daily basis. This covered things like copyright and digitisation, trade mark issues […]
Posted on: February 9, 2018 by Alexander Herman
The story begins 150 years ago. In 1868, deep in the deserts of east Africa, a British expedition led by General Robert Napier, was attacking the capital of the Abyssinian Empire, Maqdala, ruled over by King Tewodros. The British were looking to teach Tewodros a lesson for having imprisoned a number of British envoys and […]
Posted on: February 5, 2018 by Julia Rodrigues Casella Hommes
The Nazca Lines in southern Peru are possibly one of the most mind-boggling archaeological sites in the world. Filled with various geoglyphs, they are about 2,000 years old and cover an enormous area of roughly 450 square kilometres. They are an icon of Nazca culture and have been a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1994. […]
Posted on: January 24, 2018 by Julia Rodrigues Casella Hommes
An article published last Saturday in The Times has raised some interesting points about the restrictions on the ivory trade and the challenges to proper enforcement of current regulations. This is a topic that has been touched upon previously by several other sources, including The Guardian and The Telegraph. At the core of the restrictions on […]
Posted on: November 3, 2017 by Hélène Deslauriers
On 1st November, Judge John Agostini, presiding over the Pittsfield Court remarked that people “don’t often see a large crowd here,” but a large crowd had indeed gathered that day. As previously discussed, the case before him involved two separate hearings for preliminary restraining orders against the Berkshire Museum and its Trustees to stop the sale of a […]
Posted on: October 25, 2017 by Hélène Deslauriers
Following our recent post on the Berkshire Museum in Pittsfield, Massachusetts, legal action has now been taken by Norman Rockwell’s heirs against the Museum in relation to the upcoming auction sale of works from the collection. On 20th October, Norman Rockwell’s sons, Thomas, Jarvis and Peter Rockwell, along with other museum members and donors, filed a […]
Posted on: July 28, 2017 by Hélène Deslauriers
The International Foundation for Art Research (IFAR) has recently published a Provenance Guide. As set out in the Introduction to the Guide, provenance had historically concerned the attribution and authenticity of a work. The recent wave of claims by Nazi Holocaust survivors, or their heirs, as well as the threat of illegal exports from foreign source […]
Posted on: February 28, 2017 by Alexander Herman
In Yasmina Reza’s 1994 play ‘Art‘, three male friends spend much time discussing the question, ‘What is art?’ The reason is that one of the characters, Serge, has bought a work from a popular contemporary artist that is more or less just a white canvas. More or less, because there is some debate as to whether […]