Directive 2001/84/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 September 2001 on the resale right for the benefit of the author of an original work of art is a

European Union directive A directive is a legal act of the European Union that requires member states to achieve a particular result without dictating the means of achieving that result. Directives first have to be enacted into national law by member states before thei ...

in the field of

copyright A copyright is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the exclusive right to copy, distribute, adapt, display, and perform a creative work, usually for a limited time. The creative work may be in a literary, artistic, education ...

law, made under the internal market provisions of the

Treaty of Rome The Treaty of Rome, or EEC Treaty (officially the Treaty establishing the European Economic Community), brought about the creation of the European Economic Community (EEC), the best known of the European Communities (EC). The treaty was sig ...

. It creates a right under

European Union law European Union law is a system of rules operating within the member states of the European Union (EU). Since the founding of the European Coal and Steel Community following World War II, the EU has developed the aim to "promote peace, its valu ...

for artists to receive

royalties A royalty payment is a payment made by one party to another that owns a particular asset, for the right to ongoing use of that asset. Royalties are typically agreed upon as a percentage of gross or net revenues derived from the use of an asset o ...

on their works when they are resold. This right, often known by its French name ''

droit de suite ''Droit de suite'' ( French for "right to follow") or Artist's Resale Right (ARR) is a right granted to artists or their heirs, in some jurisdictions, to receive a fee on the resale of their works of art. This should be contrasted with policies such ...

'', appears in the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works (as Art. 14ter) and already existed in many, but not all, Member States. As a result, there was a tendency for sellers of works of art to sell them in countries without ''droit de suite'' provisions (e.g. United Kingdom) to avoid paying the royalty. This was deemed to be a distortion of the internal market (paras. 8–11 of the preamble), leading to the Directive.

Application of the ''droit de suite''

For the ''droit de suite'' to apply, the work, the sale and the artist must all qualify. The work must be an original work of art or a copy made in limited numbers by the artist himself or under his authority, including "works of graphic or plastic art such as pictures, collages, paintings, drawings, engravings, prints, lithographs, sculptures, tapestries, ceramics, glassware and photographs" (Art. 2), and under copyright protection rt. 8(1) The sale must involve a professional party or intermediary, such as salesrooms, art galleries and, in general, any dealers in works of art rt. 1(2) The ''droit de suite'' does not apply to sales directly between private individuals without the participation of an art market professional, nor to sales by individuals to public museums (para. 18 of the preamble). The artist must be a national of a Member State or of another country which has ''droit de suite'' provisions: Member States are free, but not obliged, to treat artists domiciled on their territory as nationals (Art. 7).

Royalty rate

Member States may set a minimum sale price below which the ''droit de suite'' will not apply: this may not be more than €3000 (Art. 3), or €10,000 where the seller acquired the work of art directly from the artist less than three years before the resale. Member States may apply a rate of 5% for the lowest portion of the resale price rt. 4(2) The total amount of the royalty may not exceed €12,500: this corresponds to a net sale price of €2,000,000 using the normal royalty rates.

Beneficiaries

The ''droit de suite'' is an inalienable right of the artist, and may not be transferred except to heirs on death, nor waived even in advance rts. 1(1), 6(1) Member States may provide for the optional or compulsory collective management by

collecting societies Copyrights can either be licensed or assigned by the owner of the copyright. A copyright collective (also known as a copyright society, copyright collecting agency, licensing agency or copyright collecting society or collective management organiz ...

rt. 6(2) As a transitional provision, Member States which did not previously have ''droit de suite'' provisions may limit the application to works of living artists until 2010-01-01 rt. 8(2)

Implementation

The provisions of the Directive are transcribed into

United Kingdom law The United Kingdom has four legal systems, each of which derives from a particular geographical area for a variety of historical reasons: English and Welsh law, Scots law, Northern Ireland law, and, since 2007, purely Welsh law (as a result of ...

by the Artist's Resale Right Regulations 2006 (S.I. 2006/346), covering work resold at a price not less than €1000 (or €10 000 as noted above).

References

Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works
# Copyright in works of art lasts for seventy years after the death of the artist: Art. 1
Council Directive 93/98/EEC of 29 October 1993 harmonizing the term of protection of copyright and certain related rights

External links

Text of directive 2001/84/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 September 2001 on the resale right for the benefit of the author of an original work of artInter-institutional adoption procedure of directive 2001/84/EC (1996–2001)