The Wilhelm tests are for colorfastness, not for any molecular change in the pigments in the inks due to aging. I know the fine art sets of inks that meet the Wilhelm specifications will clog up the giclee printer's nozzles much faster than the old vegetable dye inks. There are still some problems with the process.
http://www.wilhelm-research.com/
The prints are extremely high resolution and are generally beautiful reporductions if a talented and trained technician is operating the equipment. There are some color balances that often need to be done in from the initial computer color seperation. I worked closely with Harvest, now in Santa Ana and Classic Editions in Costa Mesa on the production of giclee prints in the 1990's. I was impressed by the process but not satisfied that it was in any way a fine art graphic process. It's a very sophisticated and automated printing process. Although it is far superior to even the up to twelve color photo-offset, it does have a look that is easily identified.
Many art publishers have returned to serigraphy because of the ability to achieve textural surfaces from screenprinting techniques.
I'm afraid the Repligraph process is able to achieve layers and textures looks more and more like an attempt at fakery.
I'm not into the molecular process. Many of the great artists I repped years ago had used so many sprays /fixatives and used many fugitive colors. I try and keep it simple and use the best materials I can. I think I'm ahead of the curve.
Yes nozzles may clog. As long as you are keeping all clean and using the finest Legion Somerset you shouldn't have a problem. We try to keep our machines running and clean.
I sincerely hope all the giclee printers are observing the quality control and not cheating on the inks.
The debate here was not just on the longevity of the giclee but the intrinsic value. The printed giclee is a publication and should be treated as such. Like Border's bargain book section, there are many outlets online with cheap giclee prints at a fraction of their publication price. The marketing scene involves a publisher who tries to fix and control the price of a limited edition. They do a good job as they're is still a myriad of amateur collectors who will buy these reproductions as collectable prints. What they don't realize is that they print depreciates 60% to 80% the moment they take it out the gallery door.
A few museum curators have approved the process for their museum shops and they are sold as commercial reproductions. Any graphic process which is just a medium for copying originals of various degress of quality (!) is not a fine art process. The prints are not original print as many shark salesmpeople will try to convince people who inadvertantly walk into a mall gallery which looks ligitimate. I know, 'cause early on in this industry I worked for the largest of these chains. It's not something I would particularly like putting on a resume despite the fact that I was a director of the gallery on the West Coast which had the highest sales.
The highest sales did come from selling original paintings, prints such as Haring and Warhol which were created by the. After five years I became weary of selling what I had discerned as disposable art and left the company.
I'ts very refreshing to hear someone who shares to same convictions I do !
I went to the art and framing show a year ago and saw "art" (cheap giclees) on canvas, in stacks divided by size and catagory.
There was no respect or reverence for any of these pieces. They were just something for the wall.
Years ago I owned a private gallery in Chicago. I couldn't live up to the rules (60% to 70% for me as the others did) hanging fees , etc.. So now I publish and work directry with the artists. Maybe I'll succeed
I can see the giclee process as a method of producing imagery -- Rauschenberg is now using it over his ink transfer process. I can see it to reproduce masterpieces but museums have been reluctant to let any of them be scanned. The
Repligraph company I believe has failed to find a viable market.
It's a great deal more expensive than the giclee process and so commercially would not work for publishers who typically mark up cost up to ten and more to retail. The markup for screenprints has shrunk in competition with the giclee and many artists and publishers shun the giclee process. Although some museum curators have endorsed the giclee method of reproduction they would be apalled at the junk art being produced. Signed and numbered? Really. Depends on who is signing and numbering the print, an artist with an internation reputation who is in museums, or some hack artist who paints decorative art for those who have no idea what constitutes a good painting or a bad painting. The result is the market is flooded with mediocre images of landscapes, flowers, figures (one particular artist includes swirling abstract colors which make no cohesive sense at all) and subject matter that was abandoned by serious artists over 60 years ago.
Vivien,
Just brainstorming a bit, when the digital image of your painting is created, perhaps one could throw little more light down from the top. This may create the brush stroke shadow which the brain can utilize to enhance the "brushmarks in 3D" upon the print. Texturizing in photoshop could control that once available.
To Lightwizard
I am a newbie here, and I am not sure I can post it here but I can't resist the temptation. I live in Orange County, CA, and plan to enter Giclee printing business. I need a mentor.
Lightwizard, or others knowlegable with Giclee, is it possible to communicate with you as you are local and seem so knowlegable in this area.
Chase
[email protected]
NKS, you might want to remove your phone number. This is the Internet, and anyone can read it and call you ....
I have stumbled on this thread today...
I have a few things to add even though the topic was hotter a month or so ago.
I am a multi-plate "photographic" etcher normally (printmaker that makes me)... I use a photographic process to expose the four (if I chose to do up to four colour images) colours onto metal plates, then etch as normal etching (occasionally adding more mezzotint if the spaces are opening up more).
I find the topic about printing and it's value always interesting and have read many things about it for this reason, ranging from the pedantic to the very lax. Basically, I never do more than 10 edition prints, due to it take a VERY long time to print one image sometimes. The last body of work that I printed in September was an extravaganza of frustration and being very anal - I managed to print the whole edition (which I don't normally do, I print them to demand). I have never been asked for a certificate of authenticity, which makes me wonder, but maybe I have never come across "real" collectors?
I wonder constantly about the issue of what to charge people for the work. The last time I had an exhibition, in August, it sold well, but in terms of the time spent on the work, I definitely undersold myself. But I wasn't sure that anyone would pay more than $800AUD for a unique state. They did, but I did want more for one of them.
I have seen people selling Giclee for approximately $600AUD and I questioned that price as well.
I do use canvas prints too - but I use it, usually, to get an image onto a canvas, usually photographic, and a bit abstract, or conceptual and i then work over the top with traditional methods.
I guess we all have different ways of working in the end.
(and yes those shiny canvas prints make my stomach turn too! They have that glittery, fairy dust look to them, blerk...)
I see screen printing as a commercial artist / graphic designers tool these days... no so much fine art.
One last thing...
I used to work occasionally with a printmaker that made reproductions (commissioned by a particular gallery) of major Australian Artists paintings, like Charles Blackman. He used a colligraph method and I believe we did approximately 100 prints of each image (plus the studio proofs and the gallery proofs, perhaps adding to 150). Sometimes we printed over 20 layers of ink onto each print to get the effect that was wanted.
I might start a new topic about print making and peoples opinions about it, but, a lot has been covered here. So we see.
You're talking about hands-on graphic work by the artist themselves. That's Kosher (right Jespah?)
The giclee process can be hands-on as mentioned before because Rauschenberg uses it now instead of his original acid transfer process he invented. Warhol used photography and screen printing to create one-of-a-kind artworks. He also produced limited editions where he did create the plates but his printing studio came up with the colorways (with his approval). However, what it is primarilly being used for is to reproduce (copy) original paintings in limited editions and the value is very questionable. Charge what the traffic will bear and, no, the traffic are not really art collectors who demand certificates of authenticity. They are nearly always offered as a sales gimmick to the novice. If one buys from a gallery whose owner, directer and the sales staff has a personal handshake with the artists or directly from the artist who is not represented by a "publisher" (a euphemism for an agent*), a certificate is not only not required, it doesn't in the end mean anything. Especially if the artist doesn't sign it. The signature on the work is the criteria of authenticity. If someone wants to fake an artwork, they will fake a certificate. I know customers who have purchased commercial limited editions off the Internet are adamant about getting a certificate which they almost always believe would help them resell the work in the future. Less than 1% of any of this work will appreciate -- maybe in a hundred years when it's considered an antique. That may change also with the proliferation of the manufactured art print. It may end up being 80's, 90's and early 21st Century junque.
*A sociopath has two obvious choices in life. Become a serial killer or an agent.
I think agents come into the catagory for me like debt collectors and parking police (what type of person thinks this is a good job??)
Thank you for your thoughts on the certificate.
I read something a few month ago (a French Canadian publication) that went on and on about them, almost to the point of them seemingly to be more important than the actual print.
benconservato wrote:I think agents come into the catagory for me like debt collectors and parking police (what type of person thinks this is a good job??)
Thank you for your thoughts on the certificate.
I read something a few month ago (a French Canadian publication) that went on and on about them, almost to the point of them seemingly to be more important than the actual print.
It was popularized as a sales feature by a company I worked for at one time in the late 80's and 90's, in fact a chain of galleries in its heydey reached over 50 locations, Martin Lawrence Galleries. They got bogged down in stale inventory, custom framing hidden costs, marketing mistakes and over-expansion and went bankrupt (two years after I left the company because they were stealing commissions). They are now owned by Chalk and Vermillion (Erte's publisher who they are still publishing
even though he's dead) who was their primary creditor and they still operate about eight galleries. A certificate of tirage stating how many are in the edition, where it was printed, et al is actually required by law. I know one major gallery in Orange County who rarely offers or issues Certificates of Authenticity. They do deal almost entirely in the reproduction limited editions and are in financial trouble at this time. When the economy is poor, people take a second look at what value they are receiving for their money (too bad they aren't savvy to it in the first place or they wouldn't pay the exorbidant price for copies of originals by artists that have a dubious position in the art world).
The giclee is a touchy subject as to how the print is stored. It's on a disk or some other computer program which is suppose to be destroyed in some way. But it's so easy to recreate the program -- not like physically destroying plates or screens in the case of a serigraph. Actually, the print can be rescanned and fakes produced quite easily. There's been so many scandals with faking the most popular mall artists like Hiro Yamagata, it's caveat emptor for the buyer. Kinkade is merely a joke -- the Pet Rock of the art industry. He is, I understand, now doing Repligraphs as well as the cheaply made poster transfers. People who buy this stuff are ignorant of art -- they can't even be called novice collectors but perhaps they could be called fake collectors. The salespeople in the primarilly mall galleries are sharks -- if they have "viewing rooms" (a euphemism for closing room), they will tell a customer anything to close a sale including that it's an investment. The sales staff has to be quite careful on how they address that because the FBI wised up in the late 80's with the Dali scandal and the new art laws forbid selling art as a secured investment. It's the most speculative of all investments and if someone approaches it with little knowledge of art, they are the sucker born every minute.
sorry to seem dumb, but when you say "mall galleries" what exactly do you mean? To you actually mean a gallery in a mall or just one of those galleries that sell reproductions of work?
Galleries in malls at least in the US seldom sell anything else but those reproductions but Martin Lawrence has embarked into selling Picasso, Chagall, Magritte and now I understand Dali prints. There were a lot of those that were reproductions so the buyer is responsible for doing their own research before buying.
And a fine mess this is -
Link to LA Times article by J. Michael Kennedy, and photos
January 18, 2007
Not a pretty picture
By J. Michael Kennedy, Times Staff Writer
Terrible - but it isn't limited to giclee prints - I went to an artists talk a few years ago, her background was in fabric design and she'd started designing greeting cards and stationery and similar stuff (very original and very attractive) and was horrified to find that an unscrupulous company was selling a wide range of goods in the US without letting her know or paying her a penny. They only had the right to produce specified items in the UK under her contract.
Hi, and welcome to a2k, Asheville Local. I'll read your link. And thanks for kickstarting this old thread (still a useful one for me to refer to).
I just now gave it a quick skim and agree with the author..
@Lightwizard,
Hi, I do not know if you still monitor these boards. Sorayama (the Japanese artist ---www.sorayama.net ) is in need of information that perhaps you know. It is regarding an art fraud case as reported in the LA Times and seems to have things in common with your posts. Do you know when and what court/county Earle had his lawsuit ? Do you know if Luongo also had this type of litigation or how to contact him. It is for presentation to the federal judges regarding problems with same publisher. Sorayama's agent---
