Barristers
Hélène Cohen
Qualifications:
Avocat à la Cour,
•Certificat d'Aptitude à la profession d'Avocat
•Diplome d'Etudes approfondies en Droit Pénal - University of Paris
Date called to the Paris Bar: 1984
Memberships
Member of the Paris Bar, Associate-Member of Tanfield Chambers since 1996, registered at the Bar Council's register of European Lawyers since 2001 and member of Gray's Inn.
Areas of Practice
Her interest for both art and law has led her to develop her legal practice in the art market where she has advised and represented collectors, artists and their successors, art historians, owners lending their work of art to Museums for exhibitions, individual buyers and sellers, art dealers and galleries.
She is specialised in the area of French legal aspects of international trade in art, and consequently deals with issues arising under French law and/or which can be brought before French jurisdiction, such as:
- · Art and copyright law
- · Artists' resale rights
- · Moral rights of the artist and his successors in the area of painting, sculpture
- · Moral rights of the artist and his successors in the context of publications of work previously non disclosed by him to the public
- · Liability of authors of "Catalogues Raisonnés" towards the artist whose work is recorded and towards third parties
- · The distribution of liability for art sales performed through Auction Houses
- · Limitation of action regarding the sale and/ or purchase of a work of art
- · Claims of rescission of a sale/purchase contract
- · The duty of diligence as regard provenance and authenticity
- · Procedural use of expert opinion in the matter of dating and authenticity
- · Cross border movement of art and French export laws regarding national treasures
- · The recovery of looted art
Her legal practice has involved works of art of some great artists such as Auguste Rodin, Francis Picabia, Alberto Magnelli, Jean Arp, Peter II Brueghel dit d'Enfer, Jean Michel Atlan.
Research and teaching
She has strong academic interests, including experience teaching at the Law Faculty of King's College, London, and at London School of Economics (LSE) where she taught French law (during the academic year 1990-91) and has been during ten years (1990/2000) the French correspondent of the European Law Review (edited by Sweet and Maxwell).
Publications
She has written on the Conseil d'Etat and the convergence between its decisions and those of the Court of Justice (ELR, No 2, 1991) and on the ratification process of the Treaty on European Union in France (ELR, No.3, 1993). She is co-author with Me. Pierre Sanglade of an article entitled "The French Legal Profession", which appeared in the 1995 edition of the 'Handbook for Practitioners: The Legal Professions in the New Europe'. She has also published on construction law (see Construction Law Review; 1997 vol. 13 n°2 " French construction law: a comparative approach"). In June 1995 she participated in a documentary produced by the BBC legal network television on French civil procedure, and in particular on differences between civil procedure in the English and French legal systems.
Languages
French, English, Spanish and Italian.
