Thoughts on limited editions

[Bill_1856]

Times change, Chris. Weston's most popular image was Pepper #30, and there are less than a couple dozen prints of it by him. Like it or not, pretty soon virtually all photographic printingf is going to be done with inkjets (or some other, more advanced, digital gizmo), and instead of the photographer taking hours to make a print (0r a few of them), it's just a question of getting the file right for the first print, then pushing a button for as many as are wanted. That will completely revise the mind-set about limited editions.

[Martin Drozda]

Is an edition meant a series of photos of the same size? I mean you can still try to sell smaller or bigger photos, in the extreme case, you may end up selling very small and huge ones. How would you perceive something like that? Many well-known artists do exactly that. I perceive this pretty fair as long as the difference between sizes is very obvious (by a factor of 2 or so). If your search through Sotheby's finished auctions, you may find some of Gursky's photos in editions of 60, of course they are very small compared to the big ones that come in editions of 4+.
Martin / www.martindrozda.com

[QT Luong]

OTOH, how many photographers have the stamina (or desire) to hand print one hundred painstakingly high quality prints from the same negative? I sure don't.

This is true for prints traditionally made.
Many contemporary art photographers, including Chris Jordan, print digitally or have prints made by someone else. So limits on number of prints have to be artificially set.

[robc]

There's nothing to say that you can't make a second edition and third and fourth edition unless you say with the first edition that only one edition will printed. Just don't say only one edition will be printed and then you are free to print as many editions as you like.

Think of it as being just like printing a book. You know the first edition will be the most valuable. Edition 20 is for the masses and the collectors can fight over print1/edition1.

Just count yourself lucky if you sell any...

[robc]

An amusing thought on limited editions:

Years ago I worked for a car manufacturer who from time to time released limited editions of their cars. Turns out the limited editions were the cars that failed quality control and which were saved up until they had enough for a special "Limited Edition" run. They fixed the faults, gave them a new paint job and some "special limited edition parts" were added such as wheels and gear lever knob and the price was jacked up to cover the costs. I wonder how many people would have bought those "Limited Editions" if they knew it was just a marketing ploy to get rid of less than average stock...

[paulr]

Chris, I'm actually interested in your $.04 on this one. We can all have our opinions about how things should be, but I'd be curious about your experience with expectations in the market you're in (yossi milo, etc.).

I had a similar conversation recently to the one you described. I was thinking about doing my inkjet prints in editions of 100, since I'd had dealers express annoyance about my silver prints being in editions of 3 to 5. My friend urged me to keep it lower ... not more than 3o. Part of it was the point you made, about no one selling 100 prints anyway. And part was that big segments of the gallery world (like Chelsea) are leaning towards artists who produce smaller editions (often of bigger prints, but that's another topic).

Have you gotten any feedback from your reps on the topic?

[paul stimac]

The more I think about small editions the more I think it's better for the collecter rather than the photographer. Plus the people who buy the Gursky's, etc are probably investors doing it for their potential to gain in value rather than their artistic merrit - doesnt' seem right.

I think photograhers have bought into this limited edition notion at the coaxing of the collectors. Who really benefits from it?

What if musicians made limited edition albums - say 3 copies of The Beatles -The White Album?

Do we sell our prints so that you can be validated as an Artiste’ or do you do it to make $$. Are the Beatles lesser artists because they sold millions of album?

- just my 2 cents -

Now changing gears - if I, as an investor, bought a Gursky print in hopes of it appreciating and he told me that it was 1 of 3, and afterwards he increased the edition size.....I would cry "fraud" and I would look into legal recourse.

[paulr]

I hear these anti-edition arguments a lot, but none of them take into account what market you're trying to sell in. If you don't care, then it doesn't hurt to do as you wish. If you're aiming for the decorative wall art market, then there's little pressure to edition, and you don't have to. If you're aiming for the higher-end gallery market, then you'll probably have to edition your prints just to be taken seriously. In this case, you will absolutely make more money with limited editions than without.

[robc]

So let me get this straight. To be taken seriously I need to put a number on my art because without a number it has no value to the buyer. To suggest that something is "wall art" because it doesn't have a number and that putting a number on it turns it into something superior indicates to me that you need to consider what being taken seriously means. In my book if the buyer is only interested in your work because it has a number on it then it means they don't take you or your work seriously. Doesn't say much about you or the buyer does it? Just tell them it was captured and printed digitally and each image is created using a randomising routine altering the colour value of several digits within the file which makes each image totally unique.
Then you can label them all one of one.

[Jorge Gasteazoro]

If you're aiming for the higher-end gallery market, then you'll probably have to edition your prints just to be taken seriously
I disagree Paul, galleries are the ones demanding these "editions" for their benefit and the benefit of the collectors. Lets not kid ourselves into thinking it is for our benefit. They even balk if you try to do a tiered system of increasing values. They want to create artificial scarcity and profit from it if you happen to make a masterpiece. Unfortunatelly, it is their ball and their court so we have to play their game but do not for a minute think this is the best option for the photographer.