Beyond Exposure
Ensuring Payment & Credit When You Don't Have a Contract
Wednesday, June 10
12-1:30pm
Virtual
We’ve all been there. You’ve created something for a client, but you haven’t been paid for your work. Artists are often asked to work “for exposure,” promised payment and creative credit that seems to never come, and frequently take work without an official contract. What can you do to advocate for yourself and hold employers accountable?
Join Arts Alliance and Lawyers for the Creative Arts for an informative and actionable session with Katie O’Neill, founding attorney at O’Neill Law. Katie will discuss how to handle payment and credit issues, particularly when you don’t have a contract. She’ll share some tactics and actions you can take to ensure that you are properly paid and credited, debunk common myths, and we’ll cover helpful laws in Illinois, including the Freelance Worker Protection Act. We’ll also take your questions.
Register for this free program and learn how to protect your livelihood and artistic work.
This is the second event in a larger Worker Rights series designed to equip artists and creative workers across Illinois with the tools, knowledge, and protections they need to thrive.
We’ve all been there. You’ve created something for a client, but you haven’t been paid for your work. Artists are often asked to work “for exposure,” promised payment and creative credit that seems to never come, and frequently take work without an official contract. What can you do to advocate for yourself and hold employers accountable?
Join Arts Alliance and Lawyers for the Creative Arts for an informative and actionable session with Katie O’Neill, founding attorney at O’Neill Law. Katie will discuss how to handle payment and credit issues, particularly when you don’t have a contract. She’ll share some tactics and actions you can take to ensure that you are properly paid and credited, debunk common myths, and we’ll cover helpful laws in Illinois, including the Freelance Worker Protection Act. We’ll also take your questions.
Register for this free program and learn how to protect your livelihood and artistic work.
This is the second event in a larger Worker Rights series designed to equip artists and creative workers across Illinois with the tools, knowledge, and protections they need to thrive.
About our Speaker
Alison Dickson
Alison Dickson is a labor economic researcher and Senior Instructor in the School of Labor and Employment Relations at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Her efforts led to the first curriculum ever developed in the U.S. (a 4th edition released in 2024) entirely focused on connecting workers’ rights education to workforce development programming. As an affiliate of the Project for Middle Class Renewal, Alison has studied job quality and policy impacts pertaining to low-wage labor markets including minimum wages, paid sick leave, fair scheduling legislation and efforts to combat wage theft and improve job quality across industries.
In addition to research, Alison has directed and taught in the Worker Rights Project, a University of Illinois initiative that provides bilingual (Spanish-English) workers’ rights training for low-wage workers. Alison is an author of several research reports and policy briefs related to issues facing Illinois workers and has provided expert testimony to the Chicago City Council, Illinois Legislative Assembly, and the International Labour Organization.