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The resale right is a right that artists allows the resale of their works of art to be involved. The legal basis for this is in Germany § 26 of the Copyright Act ( Copyright Act). Prerequisite for the right to information, which are necessary to enforce the law, however, is that the author of a member of a collecting society ( Bild-Kunst, ProLitteris ) (§ 26 paragraph 6 of the Copyright Act ).

With every second sale and all of the following sales of original works of art by the art trade visual artists are entitled to a share in the resale proceeds. In the Federal Republic of Germany, the resale right for the chancellor Willy Brandt was introduced, in particular to support young artists. In other countries - within the EU, for example in the UK, Austria, Ireland and the Netherlands - was a resale rights for a long time unknown. Thus, the art market reacted to the introduction of the resale right in many cases with the migration to those countries in which there were no relevant legal regulations. This should be a competitive disadvantage, which resulted from the payment of additional, related by the resale right amounts, can be avoided.

Directive 2001/84/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 September 2001 on the resale right of the author of the original work of art, a legal rule was adopted, which provides for an EU-wide resale rights. The Directive was implemented by 1 January 2006. Not all Member States came to the after, which is why an infringement procedure is being considered.

In Germany the Directive on 16 November 2006 has been implemented. Since this contribution is 4% of the resale proceeds ( net of tax [§ 26 para 1 sentence 2 of the Copyright Act ] ) for sales to 50,000 euros and then decreases gradually to 0.25 %, with a ceiling of 12,500 euros [§ 26 paragraph 2 of the Copyright Act ]. With sales revenues of less than 400 € (excluding taxes) is no obligation to participate in the resale proceeds [§ 26 Section 1 Sentence 4 of the Copyright Act ].

By 15 November 2006, the turnout was 5% of the resale proceeds from 50 euros and was no upper limit.