Ronald D. Spencer, Counsel - Carter Ledyard & Milburn LLP Attorney

Practice Areas

Art Law, Trusts & Estates, Personal Tax Planning for Individuals, Tax-Exempt Organizations

Practice Description

Art Law, including the legal aspects of art authentication and advising, buyers, sellers, and owners on due diligence with respect to provenance and attribution of works of art. He has helped several authentication committees and boards of experts successfully defend against claims involving their decisions on authenticity, and has advised collectors on the authenticity of their works of art. He has also helped establish numerous art foundations.

Education

A.B., 1961 Brown University (cum laude)
LL.B., 1964 Yale Law School
1965 London School of Economics
1966 University of Paris School of Law

Admissions

1966 New York

Affiliations

The Association of the Bar of the City of New York (Member: Committee on Art Law, 1998-2003; 2008-present).
Mr. Spencer is Founder and Chairman of the Fund for Park Avenue and the Park Avenue Malls Planting Project which plants tulips, landscapes and selects contemporary sculpture for exhibition on the Park Avenue Malls from 53rd Street to 86th Street in Manahattan. He is a Trustee of the Lachaise Foundation.

Publications Available on this website...

"When Experts and Art Scholars Change Their Minds," Spencer’s Art Law Journal, April 2010; "Important Estate Tax Bulletin," Client Advisory, December 29, 2009

Additional Publications

"Untouched by Nazi Hands, but Still ...," The Wall Street Journal, February 28, 2008 (co-authored). essay on Nazi-looted art.

The Expert Versus the Object: Judging Fakes and False Attributions in the Visual Arts, Oxford University Press, New York: 2004 (editor and contributing writer).

“Salomonic Connoisseurship” (concerning authenticity questions), The Art Newspaper, February 2000.

“Art Collections and Authenticity,” Trust & Estates Magazine, February 2005

Feature Articles

"Policing Provenance- Every Significant Art Collection May Contain Dubious Masterpieces Art Expert Ronald Spencer Contends," Worth Magazine, January 2005; "Wrong! But a Nice Fake Is a Valued Object in a University Art Museum," Harvard Magazine, October 2004; "The Expert Versus the Object: Judging Fakes in the Visual Arts," New York Law Journal, September 2004; "What's So Funny About Contemporary Art? Authenticating Andy," Art News, September 2004; "Is It Authentic?," Art on Paper, July 2004.

Contributions

Has written on art law matters for The Art Newspaper and the IFAR (International Foundation for Art Research) Journal and has lectured on art law at Yale, Harvard and New York University Law Schools; The Smithsonian Institution; The American Association of Museums; The Appraisers Association of America; and The Pollock-Krasner Study Center. He was invited to participate in the Pierpont Morgan Library's Annual Director's Roundtable on authenticating old master drawings (November 2005). Mr. Spencer delivered lectures, How Judges Make Decisions on the Authenticity of Visual Art, at the American Institute for Conservation, Annual Meeting (April 2007); the Bruce Museum, Greenwich, CT. (July 2007); Barcelona Museo de Historia de Catalunya (June 2007), and Congress of Spanish Museums sponsored by the Salvador Dali Foundation, Figueres y Cadaqués, Spain (October 2008) and a lecture on Nazi-looted Art in the 21st Century at the Santa Fe Museum of Art, Santa Fe, New Mexico (November 2008). He is the Editor of Spencer's Art Law Journal published on ARTNET.COM three times a year dealing with legal issues of practical significance for collectors, dealers, scholars and the general art-minded public.

Representative Clients

Foundations:	The Pollock-Krasner Foundation, the largest American private foundation devoted solely to aiding needy and worthy visual artists. The (Alexander) Archipenko Foundation The Pierre and Tana Matisse Foundation The Romare Bearden Foundation Milton & Sally Avery Foundation Alex Katz Foundation The Lachaise Foundation
Authentication Boards:	The Pollock-Krasner Authentication Board The Jacob Lawrence Catalogue Raisonné Project Andy Warhol Art Authentication Board The Roy Lichtenstein Foundation Richard Diebenkorn Catalogue Raisonné Project Archivio Alighiero Boetti Matisse Foundation: Yves Tanguy Catalogue Raisonné Project
Artists and their Estates:	Estate of Piet Mondrian The estate of the artist, Sam Francis, for art law matters. Several prominent modern painters. Two highly regarded contemporary sculptors, helping to establish private foundations to aid sculpture and other visual arts.
Owners, Buyers & Sellers of Art:	Numerous private owners of art, as well as institutions owning art. Public & private buyers and sellers, as well as several respected New York art galleries.