AMICO Press Release

June 1, 1999
AMICO Headquarters; Pittsburgh, PA

Contemporary and Modern art is now available for education! The Art Museum Image Consortium (AMICO) and the Artists Rights Society (ARS) are delighted to announce they have reached an agreement to ensure that 20th century art will be available in the AMICO Library, a subscription-based resource for use in education, research, and teaching. ARS has granted AMICO a non-exclusive, North American license to include digital images of copyrighted works of art by artists and estates represented by the Artists Rights Society in the AMICO Library, where these works may be consulted with other multimedia documentation (extended texts and other materials) created by AMICO Member Museums. In return for the use of these copyrighted works of art, AMICO will share a proportionate royalty based on subscription income with ARS.

"We've broken a log-jam," said Jennifer Trant, Executive Director of AMICO. "With this agreement the AMICO Library can fully represent the modern and contemporary works held by AMICO Members without the added burden of separate rights clearance," Ms. Trant continued. "Those AMICO Members whose collections are predominately comprised of works from these periods, such as the Whitney Museum of American Art, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, the Museum of Contemporary Art, San Diego, and the Musée d'art contemporain de Montréal, will certainly benefit from our relationship with ARS. This agreement eases the process for everyone involved."

Dr. Theodore Feder, President of the Artists Rights Society, also felt the agreement has great potential. Contemporary artists' works will be much more available for educational purposes, while ensuring their appropriate use under an educational license agreement. He was pleased that ARS could participate in the AMICO concept saying that "the Consortium helps to set the standard for dissemination of digital images of works of art in a learning setting."

AMICO Members also welcomed the enhanced coordination this ARS and AMICO agreement will provide. "We can really participate in the AMICO Library to our full potential," stated Hugh Davies, Director of the Museum of Contemporary Art, San Diego. Maxwell L. Anderson, Director, Whitney Museum of American Art, observed, "as the arts community navigates through the uncertain waters of copyright legislation in a wired world, it is very exciting to have brought two critical constituencies together in service of education: our major modern and contemporary artists and our leading art museums. Thanks to the agreement with ARS, AMICO can now aspire to present the fullest possible dimensions of contemporary art."

In the end, it's the subscribers to the AMICO Library who will benefit the most from this agreement. Contemporary art will be included in the AMICO Library without any change in the subscription fees. And individual teachers and students will not have to worry about the time consuming and uncertain process of obtaining additional copyright clearances. Over time, collaborations such as these will ensure that the AMICO Library grows in breadth and depth, to become a resource used in research, teaching and learning in all arts and humanities disciplines.

The Art Museum Image Consortium (AMICO) is a not-for-profit association of art-collecting institutions working together to enable educational use of their digital documentation. The AMICO Library is a growing collection of digital multimedia (now text and image and over time also sound and moving image), compiled by AMICO Members and made available under license for educational use. Subscriptions to the AMICO Library are available beginning July 1, 1999, through not-for-profit distributors such as the Research Libraries Group. Educational institutions, universities, public libraries, and primary through secondary schools will have access to over 50,000 works of art.

Founded in October 1997, as a program of the Association of Art Museum Directors Educational Foundation, Inc., AMICO was separately incorporated as an independent non-profit corporation in June of 1998, ending its direct connection with the AAMD. The Consortium is today made up of 28 of the major art collections in North America and is regularly adding new Members. If you are interested in becoming an AMICO Member or Subscriber, please contact Jennifer Trant, Executive Director . Full details about AMICO and its activities can be found on its web site at http://www.amico.org

Artists Rights Society (ARS) was appointed in 1986, by the French copyright societies for visual artists to represent the copyright and permissions interests of their members within the United States. Since then, ARS has signed reciprocal contracts with more than twenty other visual artists rights organizations worldwide. The membership lists of these organizations include the majority of artists active in this century, including Georges Braque, Joseph Beuys, Constantin Brancusi, Marc Chagall, Salvador Dali, Marcel Duchamp, Alberto Giacometti, Wassily Kandinsky, Fernand Léger, Man Ray, Joan Mirò, and Edvard Munch. In addition, ARS' direct European adherents include the estates of Pablo Picasso (through the Picasso Administration), Henri Matisse (through the Succession Matisse), and René Magritte. ARS also acts on behalf of American artists and actively lobbies state and federal legislatures for stronger and more effective artist's rights laws. Its American members include Milton Avery, Leonora Carrington, Willem de Kooning, Lee Krasner, Georgia O'Keeffe, Jackson Pollock, Mark Rothko, Frank Stella, and Andy Warhol.

Contact Information:

AMICO Jennifer Trant Executive Director Art Museum Image Consortium 2008 Murray Avenue, Suite D Pittsburgh, PA 15217 Phone (412) 422 8533 Fax (412) 422 8594 Email: jtrant@amico.org http://www.amico.org

ARS Dr. Theodore Feder President or Darla Decker Director of Electronic Rights Artists Rights Society 65 Bleecker Street, 9th Floor New York, NY 10012 Phone: (212) 420-9160 Fax: (212) 420-9286 Email: ddecker@arsny.com http://www.arsny.com