Museums, Art, Ethics, and the Law

Catalog description

This course examines the complex legal and ethical issues surrounding the conception, creation, communication, display, reproduction, ownership, transfer, and protection of works of art. The first unit is devoted to defining "art" and discussing artists' rights. The legal and ethical constraints affecting museums, collectors and the art market generally will be covered in the second unit, while the third unit will grapple with the problematic area of cultural property (with particular emphasis on looting, plunder, identity, trade, reparation, restitution and restitution). In each of these three segments, we shall read and discuss relevant case law, as well as a number of commentaries authored by leading experts in the field.