Arts Law Track - Courses & Requirements

The arts track prepares students to represent artists, collectors, auction houses and galleries, private foundations, and museums.

All courses are taught by prominent practicing attorneys and the blended nature of the LL.M. enables students to maximize their studies and create a curriculum particular to their goals.

The superior training provided gives graduates an edge when breaking into the competitive arts industry as an arts law attorney.

• What is an "Arts Law Attorney"?

  The diverse nature of the field requires art lawyers to have a wide range of legal expertise to represent their clients effectively and a command of the treaties, statutes, and common law that apply specifically to artists, collectors, and the art market.

  An art law attorney must have the skills of a generalist and the knowledge of a specialist. Art lawyers work in law firms, museums, auction houses, and financial institutions.

  They navigate complex issues such as:

  • Stolen art
  • Art authentication
  • Artists’ rights
  • Illicit antiquities
  • Estate planning for artists, and
  • The distribution of art in the digital age

  Although many consider intellectual property law as the core of an art law practice, representing artists, dealers, and collectors brings in multiple areas of the law including contracts, torts, estate planning, property, tax, real estate, nonprofit law, public and private international law, and Constitutional issues such as free speech and censorship.

U.S. Trained Lawyers

Prerequisites (4 of 6 required or equivalent):

• Administrative Law
• Antitrust
• Business Associations
• Federal Income Tax
• Labor Law
• Trusts and Estates

Required and elective courses provide a well-rounded but field-specific curriculum to match individual students’ interests.

Elective course topics are subject to availability of faculty and classrooms.

Note: Non-listed required and elective courses may be taken with approval of the Director of the program.

• Required Courses
• Example of Electives

International students have the option to do a special course of study in the LL.M. in Entertainment, Arts, and Sports Law to accumulate enough credits to comply with the State Board of Law Examiners’ requirements to qualify to sit for the New York Bar Exam.

These students still complete the LL.M. in the same two-semester period and earn the same degree.

If an international student does not want to take the N.Y. bar (or wants to take additional courses) he or she can use the additional courses for study of EASL electives of their choice.

Prerequisites: None

• Required Courses
• NY Bar Courses

The Hoffman Forum provides an annual opportunity to have collaborative and interdisciplinary programs related to issues at the intersection of law, public policy, the arts, and social justice Speakers include leaders from the worlds of the arts, sciences, law, politics, entertainment, sports, and business to meet in a structured setting to discuss timely and important issues and unexpected events and opportunities. The Hoffman Forum operates under the Arts Law Track in Miami Law's Entertainment, Arts and Sports Law LL.M.

• See past events

  The Aspen Institute – Artist-Endowed Foundations Initiative/AEFI – Miami Law and AEFI hosted the annual Hoffman Forum from 2014-2019. This event brought together senior leaders of artist-endowed foundations to exchange ideas. It has been hosted at: New York’s Museum of Modern Art, The Morgan Library and Museum, The Richard Avedon Foundation, The Helen Frankenthaler Foundation, The Roy Lichtenstein Foundation and more.

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  LegalLink - In 2003, EASL Advisory Board Member Carolina Jayaram, co-founded LegalLink dedicated to providing legal services to arts organizations and local artists. EASL students can work with LegalLink assiting on matters not just realted to art, but also to estate planning, family law, immigration, contracts, business law, real estate, taxes, copyright, trademark, and more. The Law School has hosted LegalLink on its premises since September 2016.

Track Directors

Vivek Jayaram - Co-Director Arts Track, Founder at Jayaram Law, EASL Advisory Board Member.

Vivek Jayaram is an attorney who practices in the areas of business litigation, copyright, trademark, and commercial transactions. He has represented a number of Fortune 500 companies as well as small and midsized corporations around the world in a variety of industries, including technology, healthcare, digital media, software, food and beverage, engineering, real estate development & construction, and the arts. Vivek has years of experience handling complex intellectual property matters and general business disputes on behalf of companies in state and federal courts around the country.

Carolina Jayaram - Co-Director Arts Track, Founding CEO at Elevate Prize Foundation, EASL Advisory Board Member

Carolina García Jayaram is the Founding CEO of The Elevate Prize Foundation, a global purpose-driven nonprofit that serves to amplify social impact and empower passionate problem solvers, leaders, and innovators.

García Jayaram has over two decades of experience in leading nonprofit organizations dedicated to enriching and shaping social impact, philanthropy, and culture. She is a devoted advocate for the democratization of philanthropy, increasing the visibility of changemakers on mainstream platforms to deepen their impact and the creation of pathways for everyone to take action and ignite social change.

She most recently served as CEO & president of the National Young Arts Foundation and, prior to that, as president & CEO of United States Artists, where she created a funder coalition endowment to help support the country’s most accomplished artists.

Faculty

Michael Cheah - General Counsel of Vimeo, one of the premiere video-sharing websites. Responsible for leading the company’s public policy and legal compliance efforts.

Lin Cherry - Chief Legal Officer and Head of Diversity & Inclusion at Wizeline

Ana Francois - Faculty member at University of Miami School of Communication. Francois specializes in media management issues such as startups, rights management and valuations.

Mansour Ghomeshi - IP expert and VP and General Counsel at 360fly. Previously lead IP counsel at Motorola and teaches course on Intellectual Property, Transactions and Negotiations. 

Jaime Rich Vining - Teaches Trademark and Advanced Trademark Law, and named a “Rising Star” by Florida’s Super Lawyer Magazine since 2009.

Dennis Scholl - Teaches Special Topics in Cinematic Arts: Producing the Art Documentary

Jonathan Zwibel - Expert in the customs laws at the U.S. border and ports of entry, with particular expertise in the legal protection of cultural patrimony and the laws preventing the international trafficking and looting of cultural property and antiquities. Deputy Associate Chief Counsel for U.S. Customs and Border Protection.

See all Faculty

Miami is a major center in today’s art world. It boasts everything from small galleries to major art fairs such as Art Basel Miami, internationally recognized as the most important annual market for modern and contemporary art.

Miami has world class museums, a remarkable group of private collections open to the public, and a community of artists supported by organizations such as ArtCenter South Florida (whose president and chief executive officer, Dennis Scholl, is an alumnus of Miami Law). The University of Miami is home to the Lowe Art Museum and the Beaux Art Festival, Miami's oldest juried fine arts festival.

The proximity of these venues is ideal for training and enables students to have site visits with gallerists, museum professionals, lawyers practicing in the field, and provides Arts track students multiple opportunities to complete their practicum requirement.

Miami Law Art News:

• Spotlight on Art Law: Intensive Course on Artists’ Role in Art Market and Philanthropic Arena
• Professor Stephen Urice Delivers Paper at Princeton University on Cultural Heritage and War Crimes
• Students Exposed to Business and Legal Side of Entertainment Law in Interdisciplinary Course on Content Distribution
• Miami Law and Aspen Institute Host Forum on Art Law and Artist-Endowed Foundations at The Museum of Modern Art, NY
• LAW & ART: Six Alumni for Whom Life is Less about the Art of the Deal than the Deal for the Art

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