Recent amendments to the Copyright Act of Canada created the
"exhibition right", i.e., artists now have the right to prohibit
exhibition unless charged a fee.  However, the fee is negotiable between
the artist and the exhibitor.  All the various cases described in this
thread have occurred in Canada, and the results have been as varied as the
cases.  While the right to demand a fee exists, payment of the fee can be
waived; some artists have done so for various considerations of the kinds
mentioned in the thread.

        More important is treatment of the right when an artist sells a
work.  If there is a simple bill of sale, all the buyer acquires is
physical possession of his work.  The buyer can place it is a private
space, e.g. a living room, where the general public does not see it.

        However, if the buyer is a museum or gallery and the museum or gallery
wants to exhibit the work, the agreement of purchase and sale must include
right to exhibit.  Usually the purchase price negotiated will include
exhibition rights in some form, running the gamut from complete freedom to
exhibit by the purchaser to various forms of restriction.

        Exhibition rights in an agreement of purchase and sale in
Canada must now be covered in addition to others such as reproduction
rights.  I believe CARFAC has a model agreement of purchase and sale for
artists, museums and galleries to use.

                        Ken Heard
                        Consultant Museologist
                        Coordinator
                        Technology and Transport Museums Sector
                        Canadian Museums Association