Art & Cultural Property

Serle Court members include several experts in the highly specialised field of art and cultural property, at both silk and junior level. Our members provide specialist advice on the ownership, sale, attribution, valuation, movement and restitution of artworks in England and internationally.

Art and cultural property disputes often involve a broad range of legal issues. Whether the issue relates to high-net-worth clients and trusts, or wills and charities, or bailments and negligence, or intellectual property and copyright, Serle Court has the breadth of expertise needed to deliver a complete and integrated service.

Our work in this field is diverse, frequently highly sensitive and complex. Members have acted in disputes involving works by a variety of artists including Gerhard Richter, Picasso, Titian, Warhol, Henry Moore, Caravaggio and Winston Churchill, as well as matters concerning Tudor correspondence, wine collections, original music manuscripts and graffiti art.

The high value and cultural significance of these assets, often spanning multiple jurisdictions and raising novel points of law, require a unique blend of legal and commercial insight.

We regularly represent and advise galleries, museums, dealers and individual artists and designers. Our experience includes multi-jurisdictional disputes between art galleries involving civil fraud, breach of contract and trade mark infringement.

Our art and cultural property members include a number of mediators and arbitrators. One member was among the first appointed to the panel of arbitrators for the Court of Arbitration for Art (CAfA) based in The Hague in 2019, reflecting Serle Court’s established reputation in international art law