Channah M. Norman

Channah is the co-chair of the firm’s Art Law Practice and advises clients on issues relating to art and cultural property law. She is an experienced business and legal advisor on museums, cultural property, the art market, art and intellectual property, and restitution and repatriation. Channah’s practice combines eight years of museum leadership as chief museum counsel for all Army museums across the United States, Europe and Asia, with seven years as a leading appellate attorney for the Department of Justice, litigating complex and novel legal issues. 

As chief counsel for Army Museums, Channah provided strategic advice and legal counsel for the National Museum of the U.S. Army and 46 subsidiary Army museums, as well as the Army Artifact Collection. This included serving as the Army’s lead attorney advising on all matters related to the opening of its National Museum in 2020. Channah advised national institutions on sensitive repatriation and restitution matters, such as Nazi propaganda art, as well as implementation of the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA). Among many other accomplishments, Channah led the team drafting the Collections Management Plan that determined the policies and procedures for all aspects of museum operations, establishing governance of Army museums.  

Channah earned a bachelor’s degree in art history and French from Cornell University, a master’s degree in art business from Sotheby’s Institute of Art in London, and an LL.M. in art and cultural property law from Georgetown University Law Center. She received her J.D. from the University of New Mexico. Throughout her studies, Channah has held multiple prestigious arts-related internships, including work at the Mimi Ferzt Gallery in New York City, the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in San Francisco, Bonhams London, the Robert Holder Ltd. art consultancy in London, and the National Endowment for the Arts in Washington, D.C. Channah also studied at the Sorbonne and the Geneva Institute in Transnational Law.

Channah serves as a faculty member of the Museum Studies Master’s Degree Program at George Washington University, teaching a course on cultural property and museum law. She is a regular presenter at art law conferences across the country, and has performed a detail to INTERPOL’s Cultural Property Crimes Program. Channah recently completed a three-year term on the Steering Committee for the Legal Issues in Museum Administration Conference and chaired the Art and Cultural Heritage Law Committee of the American Bar Association’s Section of International Law.

Before her career in art, Channah worked for two years as a business analyst in the private equity market, providing investor portfolio analyses and examining various deal structures for venture capitalists. 

Note: District of Columbia admission pending—practicing under the supervision of a licensed attorney.