DACS press release: Artists and Estates Receive £16.7 million in Royalties from DACS

On 26 August, DACS published their 2015 annual report. To view the full report, please click here.

The latest figures from 2015 demonstrate DACS’ increasingly vital role supporting the incomes of visual artists and their estates. Royalties help DACS’ members to sustain and develop their practices and can go towards anything from a tax return and insurance to a new piece of work.

In 2015, the total amount we distributed increased by 11% to £16.7 million. The number of artists and estates who benefitted increased from 19,000 to 26,000.

Almost £1.5 million went to over 1,000 artists and estates through Copyright Licensing and Artimage for the licensing of our members’ artworks in websites, books, TV, films and a range of other media.

We paid almost £10 million to over 1,500 artists and estates through Artist’s Resale Right (ARR) for secondary sales of their work on the art market.

Over 25,000 artists and estates claimed almost £4.7 million through Payback for the ‘secondary use’ of artworks - for example, photocopying and scanning of artworks in books and magazines, or the repeat broadcast of TV programmes.

Highlighting our valuable work, our member Yinka Shonibare MBE said: “DACS is a very important organisation for artists in terms of advocacy. It’s important to have an organisation that will fight for artists to at least get something."