ENTERTAINMENT
December 16, 2011 | Mike Boehm, Los Angeles Times
A bill introduced Thursday in both houses of Congress would force large art auction houses to pay a 7% royalty on sales of artworks costing more than $10,000. It would apply only to works by living artists, and dead ones whose works haven't yet entered the public domain, which occurs 70 years after the creator's death. Artists and their heirs wouldn't be the only ones getting paid. The bill, which amends existing copyright law to provide for America's first nationwide royalty on sales of visual art, calls for funneling half the proceeds to a new federally supervised fund that would help nonprofit museums buy artworks by living, U.S.-based artists.
ENTERTAINMENT
November 6, 2011 | By Michael J. Ybarra, Special to the Los Angeles Times
The watercolor portrait of the king is not exactly subtle, but it is pretty. Amar Singh II, the ruler of the Mewar kingdom in India, fills the cloth, his coral-colored gown billowing to the edges of the painting. One hand grips a bejeweled sword, while the other delicately holds a flower toward his nose. A golden halo surrounds his feathered turban. After all, he could trace his lineage back thousands of years to the god-king Rama. The painting, from the 18th century, is an icon of power — and a fitting symbol for a new show at the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco.
ENTERTAINMENT
November 2, 2011 | By Jori Finkel and Mike Boehm, Los Angeles Times
For decades, gallery owners in California have wished that the state's Resale Royalty Act of 1976, which provides artists with 5% of the sales price of artworks when they are resold under certain conditions, would just go away. While some dealers follow the law and pay the royalty to artists, others do not. But it's hard to track what artists may be owed in either case, given the difficulty of getting the galleries to disclose information on their sales. Now, working to force some disclosures as well as recover money, the foundation of the late abstract painter Sam Francis is the lead plaintiff in class-action lawsuits filed Tuesday against nine galleries in Northern and Southern California.
BUSINESS
October 25, 2011 | Bloomberg News
TCW Group Inc.'s expert witness said the asset management firm is owed $81.7 million in "reasonable royalties" from DoubleLine Capital after a jury's finding in September that DoubleLine misappropriated TCW's trade secrets. The use of TCW's trade secrets, including portfolio management systems, would have allowed DoubleLine to avoid risks and delays getting its business operating, Brad Cornell, the witness, told Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Carl J. West on Tuesday. "TCW's trade secrets are based on years, if not decades, of actual experience," Cornell said under questioning by TCW lawyer John Quinn.
ENTERTAINMENT
October 25, 2011 | By Jori Finkel, Los Angeles Times
An acclaimed Los Angeles artist who has sued a prominent local collector to enforce the California "resale royalty" law could get his day in court long before the plaintiffs in class-action suits filed last week against Christie's and Sotheby's. Artist Mark Grotjahn has sued collector Dean Valentine to recover a 5% royalty for three artworks that Valentine resold. The case, which has been quietly working its way through the courts for nearly a year, now has a trial date in March.
ENTERTAINMENT
October 19, 2011 | By Jori Finkel, Los Angeles Times
New York painter Chuck Close, L.A. artist Laddie John Dill and the estate of L.A. sculptor Robert Graham are plaintiffs in a pair of class-action lawsuits filed on Tuesday against the New York operations of Sotheby's and Christie's, alleging that the auction houses violated the California Resale Royalty Act. The 1977 California statute, a rare attempt in the U.S. to provide visual artists with a financial cut of appreciating artworks they made...