Education
Lectures & Workshops:
VLA plays an important role in educating individual artists, arts professionals within arts and cultural institutions, attorneys, students and the general public about legal and business issues that affect artistic and creative endeavors.
Each year, VLA reaches more than 5,000 people through in-house workshops; speaking engagements in the five boroughs and around the state; appearances at national conferences; radio and television appearances; VLA’s in-office resource library; teaching engagements at local colleges and law schools; and a Speakers Bureau that assists arts and cultural organizations to secure experienced legal speakers for their own events.
Our Department of Education offers a wide variety of discipline-specific and general educational programs, both at its office and privately on location for law firms and art, cultural and service organizations. VLA is also certified by the New York State Bar Continuing Legal Education Board as an accredited provider of Continuing Legal Education courses and programs. Accordingly, VLA provides CLE classes at its office, and privately for law firms at their offices. VLA also custom designs courses, including CLE classes, upon request.
To arrange for VLA to present educational programming to your constituents, members or employees, please contact Sergio Muñoz Sarmiento at 212.319.2787, ext. 13.
The following topics can be presented as lectures or workshops, and can take place at the VLA offices or your location, during lunchtime, evening, or weekends.
- Nonprofit Incorporation and Tax-exempt Status
- Contract Basics for Arts and Entertainment Professionals
- LLC, “C” Corp, or “S” Corp: Choosing the Right Corporate Structure For Your Arts Business
- Managers in the Arts & Entertainment Industry
- Film School for Attorneys: Produce, Write & Direct Independent Feature Films
- Legal Issues in the Music Industry
- Intellectual Property (copyright, trademark, patents, VARA)
- Contracts (music, performance, literary, visual art)
- Legal Issues in Dance (including ownership of choreography)
- Digital Media and Intellectual Property
- Landlord Tenant Issues Affecting Visual Artists
- Differentiating Employee and Independent Contractor Status
- Taxes and Financial Planning for Artists
- Legal Issues in Filmmaking
- First Amendment: Free Speech, Defamation, Privacy, Right of Publicity
- Institutional Advancement and Grant-Writing for Nonprofit Arts Organizations
- Visual Culture and Law
- Law and Film
Selected locations where VLA has presented lectures, workshops, or VLA Bootcamps™:
artHARLEM
Bronx Museum
Bronx Museum AIM Program
Brooklyn Arts Council
Brooklyn Law School
College Art Association
Columbia Law School
Columbia University School of the Arts
Cultural Alliance of Greater Washington
D.C. Commission on the Arts and Humanities
Dance/NYC
Hofstra University, Department of Department of Fine Arts, Art History and Humanities
Independent Press Association
Jack the Pelican Presents Gallery
John Jay College of Criminal Justice, Department of Art, Music & Philosophy
Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, Workspace Program
New York Foundation for the Arts
New York Public Library
New York State Bar Association, Entertainment Arts and Sports Law Section
New York University
Parsons The New School for Design
Polytechnic University
Pratt Institute
Queensborough Community College-CUNY
School of Visual Arts
Six Points Fellowship
Staten Island Arts Council
The Juilliard School
Theater Resources Unlimited (NYC)
Westport Country Playhouse
Yale School of Management, Arts & Culture Club
New since 2005, a program about the legal and business issues that affect individual artists and individuals within arts organizations and cultural institutions. Law students, attorneys and other professionals who represent artists may also benefit from this program. Starting in fall 2005, VLA has offered the program in venues around the United States. For additional information about the boot camp please click here.