Barbara T. Hoffman

Barbara T. Hoffman


The Hoffman Law Firm

Recognized since 2010

New York, New York

Practice Areas

Art Law

Copyright Law

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Barbara T. Hoffman, principal, is a pre-eminent arts, cultural heritage and cultural institution lawyer in New York City providing transactional advice and litigation services to the domestic and international arts and cultural community. Her more than thirty-five years in the field of art law, representing artists, museums, collectors, artist and other charitable foundations, galleries and foreign governments has given her wide expertise on matters involving art, antiques and cultural property transactions, including art gallery and auction house consignments, gifts of art, copyright and artist's rights, and non-profit issues of governance and conflict of interest. She is a pioneer in the field of public art and developed, for the New York City Bar Association, the model contract for the field. She has represented a majority of renowned artists working in the public realm with projects worldwide involving large scale private and public scales from memorials to AIA award-winning artist-architect collaborations from Battery Park to Shanghai and points in between. She is included in New York Magazine's Best Lawyers for 2010 - 2011, 2012, Marquis Who's Who and Super Lawyers (2010-2016), and the Wall Street Journal Best Women Lawyers in New York (2016). She is a Fellow of the American Bar Association.

Ms. Hoffman litigates and counsels in the intellectual property and related areas such as author's rights, publishing, film, TV and entertainment, internet and new media. Ms. Hoffman has successfully resolved numerous copyright claims, as well as right of publicity and privacy claims pre-summary judgment on behalf of artists, photographers and photographer's estates. In addition to litigation, Ms. Hoffman understands the importance of maximizing intellectual property assets to protect the intellectual property of her clients. She counsels on a wide variety of complex copyright and licensing issues in the traditional as well as new media. Representative matters include licensing of characters, theatrical performances, images and literary works and advising on all legal matters related to the production and distribution of film and TV product. She is the editor of the Exploiting Image Archives in New Media (Kluwer Law 1996).

Not surprisingly as an art lawyer, Ms. Hoffman is passionate in her representation of visual artists and entrepreneurs. Ms. Hoffman's innovative and creative approach to lawyering has resulted in precedent-setting legal decisions on behalf of artists in copyright, fair-use and moral rights, art litigations having represented successfully the plaintiff in Ringgold v. Black Entertainment Television, Inc., 126 F.3d 70 (2d Cir. 1997), establishing copyright protection for visual images on parity with that of music in film and television, the defendant in Barris v. Hamilton et al., No. 96 Civ. 9541, 1999 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 7225 (S.D.N.Y. May 17, 1999), Flack v. Friends of Queen Catherine, Inc. et al., 139 F. Supp. 2d 526 (S.D.N.Y. 2001), establishing the artist's droit moral (right of integrity) in a public sculpture commission, and Daniel Morel in Agence France Presse v. Morel, No. 10 Civ. 2730 (WHP), 2011 WL 147718 (S.D.N.Y. Jan. 14, 2011) involving the theft of a photojournalist's images from the internet by AFP, Getty Images, CNN, ABC and CBS.

Ms. Hoffman represents a wide range of corporate, institutional, and individual clients including prominent visual artists and their estates, museums, galleries, architects, photographers and leading photo agencies, advertising agencies, authors, publishers, entrepreneurs, Internet providers, and content distribution companies. She has been counsel to award winning film and TV productions and documentary producers including numerous international co-productions.

Because of her widely recognized expertise, she has been a frequent invited speaker at conferences and CLE programs. Recent speaking engagements have been at the Lalit Kala, New Delhi, India, MAXXI, Rome, the De Young Museum, San Francisco, California and the United States Chamber of Commerce, Shanghai, China, and the Foreign Ministry, Asunción, Paraguay.

As an active participant in the sectors she serves, Hoffman through various leadership positions has influenced an understanding of the law as it affects her various constituencies and is often at the forefront of new developments and future trends. For example, Hoffman participated as a representative of the College Art Association at the USPTO Conference on Fair Use ("CONFU") where she initiated the image-based task force.
She is a former Chair of the International Bar Association Committee on Art, Cultural Institutions and Heritage Law and the Chair of the New York City Bar Association Committee on Art Law. She was also the first woman associate professor of law at Seattle University School of Law (formerly UPS) where she taught for ten years before returning to full time legal practice in New York.

Ms. Hoffman served for ten years as outside counsel to the College Art Association, is a former board member of Art Table, New York Women in Film and Television, the Williams Art Conservation Institute, the Explorers Club where she was also chair of the legal committee and AICA, the International Association of Art Critics. She currently serves inter alia on the Boards of Performa, the Any One Can Fly Foundation, Currents - Art and Music, and the Salvador Dali Foundation.

She has continued through her writing, advocacy and client representation to define the law as it applies to new information technologies and the image and art world. See Kluwer: Hoffman ed., "Exploiting Images and Image Collections in the New Media: Gold Mine or Legal Minefield?" She has also attended regularly as an invited guest major biennales, Documenta, Münster, and art fairs since the 1980's.
She is fluent in French, Spanish and Italian.

Ms. Hoffman began her law career as an assistant corporation counsel for the City of New York. She then was a full time associate professor of law from 1975-1985 teaching constitutional law, land use and property, art law, and intellectual property. In 1985, she returned to full time legal practice in New York City. She also taught Art and the Law at the School of Visual Arts, Fashion Institute of Technology, and courses in U.S. Copyright Law in the Master of Law Program at the Université of Lyon, Lyon France. In June of 2007, she developed an international art law course for St. Johns University School of Law in Rome.

Location
  • 330 West 72nd Street
    New York, NY 10023
Languages
  • English
  • French
  • Italian
  • Spanish
Education
  • Brown University, B.A.
  • Columbia University, J.D.
  • Johns Hopkins University, M.A.
  • London School of Economics and Political Science, M.A.
Bar Admissions
  • New York, New York, 1972
  • District of Columbia, District of Columbia, 1979
  • Washington, Washington, 1982
  • United States, U.S. District Court Western District of Washington
  • United States, Supreme Court of the United States of America
  • United States, U.S. Court of Appeals 9th Circuit
  • United States, U.S. Court of Appeals 2nd Circuit
  • United States, U.S. District Court Southern District of New York

Recognized in The Best Lawyers in America® 2024 for work in:
  • Art Law
  • Copyright Law
Special Focus:
  • Art
  • Copyright
Additional Areas of Practice:
  • Entertainment Law - Motion Pictures and Television
  • Entertainment Law - Music
  • First Amendment Law
  • Litigation - Intellectual Property
  • Media Law
  • Trademark Law

Publications

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