Studio Capital Secures Victory in Painting Resale Litigation

This week, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals ended a long-running litigation over the sale of a Rothko painting by affirming a judgment in favor of our clients David Martinez and Studio Capital.

In 2010, the plaintiff filed a suit against David Martinez/Studio Capital claiming that the re-sale of this painting at auction violated a confidentiality term in the original contract of sale.

After a jury trial in Dallas in December 2013, Cleary won judgment as a matter of law on the ground that the gallery that had purchased the painting and negotiated the contract was not David Martinez/Studio Capital’s agent. The 5th Circuit affirmed on the broader ground, which we had argued from the start, that the agreement had not been breached because it did not prohibit re-sale, by auction or otherwise.