Membership

By becoming a member of Artists Rights Society, you are taking an active step to protect the copyrights of your work.

At ARS, membership is always free. This means no initiation fee or annual dues.

At ARS, we manage the intellectual property rights for educational and commercial uses. Additionally, ARS has long standing relationships and agreements with museums, auction houses, and publishers, obliging them to request advance permission and to pay fees for reproductions. ARS also administers and collects fees for the rights of publicity and personality on behalf of our members.

ARS membership in CISAC, the Paris-based umbrella organization that oversees the activities of international copyright collecting societies, automatically confers on each ARS member reciprocal membership in other CISAC organizations abroad. Through this relationship with our 44 foreign “sister societies,” ARS is able to monitor and license your work in as many nations worldwide. 

By becoming a member of ARS, you are provided access to legal services, provided the issue concerns copyright and intellectual property matters. ARS actively monitors for unauthorized reproductions of your work. Should illicit use of your work be spotted by an ARS team member or brought to our attention, ARS will take the appropriate steps to have such unauthorized uses removed. Additionally, ARS insists that the artist copyright notice always appear in conjunction with any reproduction of the artist’s work and will take appropriate action if such is omitted.

Of course, ARS is guided by any special instruction that you, the artist, gives. ARS maintains communication with commercial entities and actively generates proposals for consideration for those artists who are enthusiastic about licensing their work. 

Payments, along with reports detailing uses for the period, are sent to members on a semi-annual basis.

Become a Member
Download our Membership Agreement (PDF)

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