Katherine de Vos Devine

Sophisticated protection. No burned bridges.

Most IP attorneys force creative professionals to choose: protect your rights or preserve your working relationships. Katherine doesn't accept that trade-off.

She practices relational law, a legal strategy that protects both what you create and how you create it. This approach emerged from collaborative divorce practice, where attorneys learned to manage conflict while preserving relationships that continue after legal resolution. Katherine applies the same framework to creative businesses: you operate within networks of recurring collaborators, so aggressive legal strategies that burn bridges can damage your entire ecosystem.

Katherine occupies a rare professional intersection. She holds a J.D. and Ph.D. in Art History from Duke University, where her dissertation examined appropriation art and transformative use doctrine from the 1990s through 2010s—studying artists like Richard Prince and Sherrie Levine as case studies in how copyright doctrine evolved. Before practicing law full-time, she led arts organizations including the Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center and North Carolina Glass Center. She understands creative ecosystems from the inside because she's run them.

That cultural fluency shapes how she practices. When you explain your business model, Katherine recognizes the patterns—she's seen how galleries operate, how collaborative studios structure relationships, how artists balance creative control with commercial sustainability. She teaches Art & Entertainment Law at Queens University of Charlotte and co-chairs the College Art Association's Committee on Intellectual Property, currently leading the 10-year update to the Code of Best Practices in Fair Use for the Visual Arts. Her speaking venues include the College Art Association Conference, Yale School of Art, and Harvard/Getty symposiums.

She writes Protect Your Magic, a Substack newsletter connecting IP law, art history, and feminist analysis. In 2026, she's launching Implement Tools—a contract template shop offering lawyer-drafted agreements for early-career creatives who need sophisticated protection at accessible prices.

Katherine specializes in copyright, trademark, nonprofit law, and contract strategy for creative businesses with $100K-$3M annual revenue. She's admitted to practice in North Carolina.

Outside the office, Katherine practices archery, walks in forests, cooks elaborate meals, and reads voraciously.