IAF statement on Artist’s Resale Right at SCCR37

Luke AlcottArtists Resale Right, News, WIPO

As the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) held the 37th session of its Standing Committee on Copyright and Related Rights (SCCR), Maureen Duffy spoke on behalf of the International Authors Forum (IAF) to give the authors’ view on the Artist’s Resale Right (ARR).

WIPO is a special agency of the United Nations dealing with copyright at an international level. The SCCR includes government representatives of the 191 UN member states.

The International Authors Forum represents over 700,000 authors including visual artists and we wish to express our thanks to those member states who have supported the Resale Royalty Right (or droit de suite), in particular Senegal and Congo for its proposal to include Artist’s Resale Royalty Right as a standing item on the future agenda of the SCCR which we approve of. We also thank all of the member states who have supported the establishment of the task force on Resale Royalty Right.
We hope to take the opportunity to feed into the work of the task force through the expertise of our members who manage, support or hope to establish this right in their country.

We hope the taskforce has the opportunity to consider how:

  • Resale Right can create an eco-system where arts flourish, funding the seed of future creation for artists whose work is already valued.
  • Resale Right can give a fair contribution from the global art market to the community of the creator.
  • It is important that artists in all countries can benefit from the resale of their creations; artists’ rights internationally will ensure that in every country, artists’ creation is respected and encouraged.

The artists’ resale right has seen progress around the world, in the USA there is now bipartisan support for the American Royalties Too Act, which would introduce resale right. We hope WIPO members could support this progress.

The International Authors Forum strongly supports the inclusion of the Artist’s Resale Right on the SCCR agenda and proposals for a Resale Right task force at WIPO. We hope the task force will drive progress to ensure artists receive fair remuneration for their creation and that it will promote the right as an issue of fairness to artists whose work is traded in the globalised art market.