The Legal Concept of Art

This book examines the treatment of art within the legal subjects of obscenity, copyright, libel, customs, public art funds, charitable trusts and movement of national treasures. The text includes comparisons with French, American and EU Law. In this analysis of the regulation of art by law,Dr. Kearns has produced an innovative treatise with both practical and jurisprudential implications. He examines the treatment of art within seven distinct traditional legal subjects, namely obscenity law, copyright law, libel law, the public funding of art, the law of charitable trusts, customs law and the law on the movement of national treasures, identifying in each the specialised problems law faces, not least given the lack of a universally acceptable definition of art. Based primarily on English law, the text achieves an added richness by a comparative dimension including French, American and European Union Law. In this way a unitary idea of how law tackles its operation on art is achieved. This is the first monograph on the holistic treatment of art law in the United Kingdom.