Art, Cultural Heritage, and the Law

Book excerpt: Art, Cultural Heritage, and the Law is one of the first legal casebooks to address the rapidly emerging fields of art and cultural heritage law, utilizing an interdisciplinary approach. This book addresses artists' rights (freedom of expression, copyright, moral rights and rights in architectural works and historic preservation); the functioning of the art market (dealers and auction houses, warranties of quality and authenticity, transfer of title and recovery of stolen art works, and the role of museums), and finally cultural heritage (the fate of art works and cultural objects in time of war, the international trade in art works and cultural objects, the archaeological and underwater heritage of the United States, and indigenous cultures, focusing on restitution of Native American cultural objects and human remains, and appropriation of indigenous culture). The new edition, available summer 2008, will retain the basic structure of the first edition while updating case law, policies and events. It will include recent materials and developments, such as new cases (Malevich v. City of Amsterdam, resolution of the Barnes dispute, recent deaccessioning disputes, Iran v. Barakat, U.S. v. Ligon), recent restitutions of ancient art works from US museums to Italy and other countries, and new museum policies. There will also be an expansion of treatment of underwater cultural heritage, historic preservation, and archaeological resources.