1. Who we are
Arthouse83 is a digital gallery service operated by So & Co Enterprises Limited. We are the controller of personal information used to run artist accounts, subscriptions, service security and our own support activities.
- Operator
- So & Co Enterprises Limited, trading as Arthouse83
- Company number
- 08379988 · registered in England and Wales
- VAT registration number
- GB 384675843
- Registered office
- First Floor North, 40 Oxford Road, High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire, England, HP11 2EE
- Contact
- team@socoprojects.co.uk
Contact us at the email or postal address above for privacy questions or to exercise your data protection rights.
2. Information we collect
- Account information: your email address, artist name, biography, sign-in verification records, account preferences and the time and document versions recorded when you accept our Terms and conditions and Privacy statement.
- Your exhibitions: uploaded images and filenames, artwork descriptions, dates, dimensions, store links, gallery layouts, placements, snapshots, published versions and ownership references. Images or descriptions may contain personal information you choose to upload.
- Membership and billing: your plan, trial and access dates, Stripe customer and subscription references, payment status and relevant billing communications. Stripe collects payment details directly; we do not receive or store your full card number or card security code.
- Support and security: information you send us, administrative access changes, sign-in attempts and technical records needed to investigate problems or abuse. Our hosting and service providers may process IP addresses and request logs.
- Business enquiries and contacts: your name, business contact details, website and correspondence when you enquire about the service or communicate with us. Where we carry out business outreach, contact details may come from public business websites, directories or referrals.
- Gallery activity: exhibition openings and artwork-detail clicks, associated with the gallery, published version and artwork. These are activity counts rather than counts of identifiable people.
Without the email and account information needed for sign-in we cannot provide an artist account. You choose which artwork and profile details to add. Payment information is required only when you choose a paid subscription.
3. Why we use information
| Purpose | Lawful basis |
|---|---|
| Sign-in, artwork storage, gallery editing, publishing and membership management | Performance of our contract with you; legitimate interests in administering accounts for an organisation you represent |
| Billing, tax records and responding to lawful requests | Legal obligations where applicable; contract for processing your subscription |
| Security, troubleshooting, fraud prevention and protection of artwork provenance | Legitimate interests in protecting the service, its users and their work |
| Limited exhibition statistics for gallery owners | Legitimate interests in understanding exhibition activity, subject to a documented assessment of visitors’ rights |
| Relevant business communications and optional marketing | Consent where required; legitimate interests for appropriate business communications where permitted by the applicable marketing rules, with an opt-out |
Where we rely on legitimate interests, you can object to that processing. If we rely on consent, you can withdraw it without affecting earlier lawful processing. We do not use gallery statistics to make decisions with legal or similarly significant effects about visitors.
You can object to direct marketing at any time by contacting us or using an unsubscribe link where provided. Opting out of marketing does not stop essential account, security or billing messages.
More information: ICO guidance on lawful bases.
4. Public galleries and artwork protection
Unpublished exhibitions are private to your account. When you publish, the exhibition, displayed artwork and associated public details can be viewed by anyone with access to the public link, including through website embeds. Public pages may be indexed or copied by others. Unpublishing removes access through our service, but cannot recall copies already made by visitors or other websites.
Gallery owners decide which people and personal information appear in uploaded content and must have an appropriate basis for publishing it. A gallery owner may have their own privacy responsibilities. If a photograph or exhibition concerns you, contact its owner or us so we can consider your request.
Where watermarking is enabled, displayed images contain an Arthouse83 watermark and a hidden signed identifier linked to our artwork records. We retain source references and an image fingerprint to help verify provenance. The marker does not track visitors or identify the person who copied an image, and it does not prevent all copying.
7. How long we keep information
We retain current account details, artwork, galleries, subscription details and other current information while they are in use to provide the service. An expired trial, cancelled renewal or suspended membership does not itself close your account or delete current content.
You can close your account under Account in the artist studio. Closing hides your galleries immediately, stops subscription renewals and starts a 30-day recovery period. We send a closure confirmation and reminders seven days and one day before the deletion date. You can sign in and reinstate before the deadline shown in your account. After 30 days, the account, artwork and galleries are scheduled for permanent deletion, including managed backup copies and stored image versions, except for records required for statutory purposes.
Historical records, including statistics, superseded gallery versions, correspondence, logs and artwork-provenance records, are retained for no more than three calendar months. Short-lived authentication and visitor identifiers expire sooner. Statistics show only retained history. A previous published version can be reverted to only while retained. A current live exhibition remains available while in use, even if published more than three months ago.
We retain only necessary financial and tax records for statutory purposes: ordinarily six years for UK VAT records, or ten years where OSS/MOSS rules apply. These records are restricted to their statutory purpose and do not require keeping the entire closed account. See HMRC’s VAT record-keeping requirements. We also keep the minimum current opt-out information needed to honour a request not to receive marketing.
Deletion jobs retry if a provider or storage service is unavailable. Closed accounts remain inaccessible during retries. A restricted record of hashed erased-account identifiers is held for up to three months so that restored backups cannot reactivate erased accounts. Independent copies made by visitors or external websites are outside our control. Payment providers may retain records they are legally required to keep as independent controllers.
8. Your rights and complaints
Depending on the circumstances, you can ask for access to your personal information, correction, deletion, restriction, or a portable copy of information you provided. You can object to processing based on legitimate interests and object to direct marketing. Some rights are subject to exceptions, including where records must be retained by law.
Email team@socoprojects.co.uk with your request. We may need to confirm your identity proportionately before acting. We will respond within the applicable legal time limit and explain any lawful extension or refusal.
You can complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office. You do not have to contact us first, though we welcome the opportunity to address a concern.
9. Changes to this statement
We will update this statement when the service or our handling of information changes, and bring material changes to your attention where appropriate. The effective date is shown above.
For more about use of the service, read our Terms and conditions.