Season’s greetings from all of us at Amineddoleh & Associates!

Like so many of you, all of us at Amineddoleh & Associates missed meeting with our friends and colleagues this year, but we send you warm wishes for a happy and healthy holiday season and a prosperous 2021. Although 2020 was a challenging year, it was also a banner year for the firm. In addition to securing a win for the Greek government in a landmark litigation against Sotheby’s auction house and its consignors in Barnet et. al v. Ministry of Culture and Sports of Hellenic Republic, we were also retained by the Republic of Italy in another cultural heritage dispute, Safani v. Republic of Italy. In this case, we are representing Italy in a lawsuit involving an antiquity excavated from the Roman Forum and potentially stolen from a national museum.

In addition to these high-profile representations, we continue to work with clients on a variety of intellectual property, art and cultural heritage, and estate matters. Below are some of the highlights of this year:

• Working with a film producer to secure a deal with Showtime Network and providing legal guidance for a contract with Miramax;
• Assisting a client in the sale of a previously undiscovered “sleeper” work (a previously misattributed painting);
• Representing a number of artists and designers in intellectual property disputes;
• Assisting collectors in the acquisition and authentication of works;
• Successfully securing trademarks for foreign and domestic clients;
• Resolving disputes between auction houses, collectors, and galleries.

2020 was also an exciting year for our team in terms of professional achievements and accolades. Leila was honored to speak at the Frick Collection on the importance of provenance. During the lockdown, she participated in a podcast series for the Victoria & Albert Museum, and she also discussed art and heritage issues for various educational institutions, including the American Bar Association, American University, Wake Forest University School of Law, and Christie’s Education. In addition, she served as a cultural heritage law expert on Turkish television channel TRT World, published a law review article about the political dimensions of cultural heritage, and appeared in a number of news sources, including the LA Times, ABC News, Artnet, and the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists. Leila also contributed a chapter, addressing the legal implications of art and antiquities’ provenance, to the recently-published volume Provenance Research Today: Principles, Practice, Problems.

Claudia completed a year-long legal internship at Constantine Cannon in London, where she worked on a cultural heritage legislative drafting project and developed multiple proposals for the Global Legal Hackathon with teams from the UK, Italy, US, and South Africa. She has multiple journal articles scheduled for publication in 2021, and she will serve as a panelist at the TIAMSA Conference in July 2021, discussing the role of deaccession in museum practice and its overlap with diversity initiatives.

We look forward to a productive year ahead and what are sure to be interesting developments in the field of intellectual property and art and cultural heritage law.

HAPPY HOLIDAYS!