Supporting Individual Artists Coffee Chat

Legal Support for Artists

Americans for the Arts is excited to bring you a monthly series of informal discussions about supporting individual artists. As part of Americans for the Arts ongoing program, Arts Administrators Essentials: Supporting Individual Artists, these monthly "Coffee Chats" are your opportunity to hear from individuals and organizations in the arts and culture field that support individual artists as part of their everyday work. Each month, we will bring you a new topic to support your work with artists. Our topic for March 2019 will be legal support for artists.

Why exactly do artists need lawyers and legal support? 

Join Adam Holofcener Esq., Executive Director of Maryland Volunteer Lawyers for the Arts, for a discussion on how artists operate as a business and the types of situations they can find themselves in that have legal implications (both good and not so good).  Issues that artists generally encounter first involve copyright, contracts, and business entities. Artists do not need to become lawyers to practice their art in a fiscally/legally sustainable way, but they do need to know enough to know when to ask for help, as well as what resources are available that may be able to provide affordable help. 

This project is supported in part by the Emily Hall Tremaine Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts.