The Legal Regulation Of The Transaction Of Art Works

Works of art possesses economy value, social value and cultural value. The transaction of art works is not just a transaction of common products but its great economy effect will cause considerable influence to our national economy. At present, laws and regulations concerning with the transaction of works of art in China are still at its infant stage. Compared with Germany and United States, transactions of works of art are still in a state of disorder. Our research traces the whole process of the transaction of art works, analyzes every step of the transaction and tries to point out problems underlying it. Chapter 1 describes the concept differences between commonly acknowledged works of art and the technical terms in law on works of art. Terms as copies, replica, counterfeits and works of art are defined from the law perspective. Chapter 2 focuses on the copyrights of works of art in transaction. Here we made it clear that after the transaction of works of art, copyright holder still hold the copyright. Legally, a product of works of art is different from the works of art, while in China people usually misunderstand the two concepts. In China, violation of copyright after the transaction has become a common phenomenon because people believe that the copyright of a piece of works of art is sold together with the product during the transaction. Chapter 3 discusses the two major ways of transaction of art works:art gallery transaction and auction house transaction. Confused responsibility and rights between the artist and the gallery is recognized as the typical problem in gallery transaction. Still, there lacks a contract between the two sides in most transactions. False auction and auction of false works have become another problem. Chapter 4 centers on the appraisal of works of art. Due to lacks of legal and authority appraisal organization, appraisal of works of art is also in disorder, and this makes the transaction of works of art loses the last fireproof wall.From three aspects, economy principles, government and policy monitoring, and present laws, this article discusses problems in China's works of art transaction. Economically, due to the low cost and high gains of forgery, counterfeiters seek to make big fortune by risk causes the wide-spread of fake products and replicas. Lack of monitoring from government, low credit fashion, price system incompletion and other factors gave space to this disorder. The unsoundness of legal system provides even more chances for counterfeiters to make use of it. The research also tries to give some suggestions to make our art transaction market healthier. Among these, strengthening the monitoring of government, putting control and development together are the two important measures. Others include establishment of appraisal system, issuing of professional qualification certificates, whole responsibility of appraisal organs and so on.