Stephen Goldberg’s Art Law Column

The Hermès Birkin handbag is the stuff of legend. Named for actress Jane Birkin, each bag is hand-tooled in the finest leather or crocodile. The bags are highly sought out by the nouveau riche. Customers for new releases are placed on a waiting list and there is a brisk online resale market with some vintage […]

Great Britain is in serious decline. The City has lost its position as Europe’s indispensable financial center, the UK economy is in recession and its vaunted National Health Service is in shambles. The Tories have ruled Britannia for 12 straight years, much of it in dealing with a self-imposed catastrophe known as Brexit under the […]

A bomb explodes in one of the Met’s galleries leaving 13-year-old Theo motherless in the harrowing opening of Donna Tartt’s 2013 bestselling novel, The Goldfinch. In the wake of the explosion, caused by an apparent terrorist attack, a mysterious survivor prompts Theo to steal Dutch 17th-century artist Carel Fabritius’ painting of the small colorful bird, […]

The age of artificial intelligence (AI) has arrived whether we like it or not and now it has come to the art world. That should not really be much of a shock. It’s now five years since AlphaGo defeated the best Go players in the world. Writers have auto-complete options readily available. AI is facilitating […]

Jean-Michel Basquiat, some say, was an artistic genius. His paintings’ auction values now equal or exceed those of his friend and mentor, Andy Warhol. A couple of top-notch Basquiat shows wowed New York City this past summer, including a major exhibition sponsored by his family members. But it was another show at the Orlando Museum of […]

The record prices set at the Spring auctions in New York, such as the sale of Warhol’s 1964 silkscreen, Shot Sage Blue Marilyn, that sold for $195 million, diverted attention from the shocking announcement for the city to deregulate its multi-billion dollar auction business—finalized just a week before the hammers fell at the widely watched showrooms of […]