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Interview
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NOTE:
In an upcoming
issue of
Art Business News
Magazine
(month to be announced) you will find us/our VirtualOriginals™
process (along with other printing firms) featured in two of the
five articles they are running in their supplement to that
issue. The supplement is devoted entirely to Digital Fine Art
Print Making. Below are all the questions I was asked to respond
to for that interview by the magazine’s editors. I hope you find
my responses interesting and informative.
Erik Ciel
Publisher/Art Consultant |
Interview questions from Art Business
News Magazine and unedited responses to them:
What does
Erik Ciel Fine Arts offer artists (seeking Giclées of their paintings or
digital originals of their photographic works) as far as quality?
 e
can bring to bear and apply for any artist whose works we publish
the techniques, practices, understanding and technology that cost us
nearly three years of effort to perfect. Efforts which ultimately
enabled us to begin offering VirtualOriginals™ of the works of the
artists I represent as well as of those for whom we now produce
prints. This capacity relates to both fine art painting reproductions as
well as photography.
What sets
your company apart from other giclée printers?
The process we have developed and our understanding of how to configure
that process in a way that enables us to offer results that only a
handful of firms in the country can offer.
Can you
elaborate on the steps Erik Ciel Fine Arts takes to create Giclées,
including scanning, editing, proofing and printmaking?
No. To give specifics would get into revealing proprietary processes and
practices that have cost us untold amounts of time and capital to
acquire. Suffice it to say, no cutting of corners; as my friend,
Academy Award winner,
David Coons said recently, “Many
printers know what to do, they just don’t do it.”
Why is the
printmaker so important in the creation of a high-quality giclée?
The printmaker is the human face (interface) between a work of art and
the technology labyrinth that produces a giclée. A printmaker must be
dedicated to and capable of pushing that technology to its limits or
that potential is like fertilizer left in the bag.
They must also keep their role transparent and not unduly intrude upon
the original’s transition to its giclée. The best printmakers see
themselves as a conduit that enables the power of the original to flow
uncorrupted through them to the print. It is a balancing act that
necessitates blending a subjective awareness of the artist’s intent with
very unforgiving, pragmatic hardware and software.
What is a
VirtualOriginal™ Giclée?
A
VirtualOriginal™ is an uncompromising reproduction of an original
painting. The term VirtualOriginal™ is the name I coined and trademarked
to both describe our process as well as the end results of said process.
Our goal, from the beginning of what turned out to be a nightmarishly
long learning curve, was to hold absolutely nothing back. I wanted the
collectors of my artist’s work to have a reproduction so true to the
artistic intent, power and excitement of the original that it and the
original were “virtually” indistinguishable.
Amazingly, many people felt this was a silly goal; I’ve even heard
artists and print makers say, “Why bother making it that good,
they’re never going to see the original so why waste your time trying –
they’ll never know the difference.”
I
shake my head when I hear such talk and walk away; they just don’t get
it. Namely, that unless they are striving to give you as much of the
magic of the original as is humanly and technologically possible, they
are short changing you with a watered down version of the artist’s work.
Do
VirtualOriginal™
quality prints debase the value of an original painting?
Some argue that it
“will undermine and debase the value of the original” to have
reproductions that for all practical purposes are indistinguishable from
the original. Such thinking, in my opinion, is not only unfounded from a
marketing standpoint, but elitist and selfish in its origin – not to
mention practically guaranteed to help kill sales of an artist’s
reproductions. Would you want to buy and hang a glorified,
deliberately compromised reproduction of an original work that in
its original form had the power to make your heart sing a song?
It is the artistic
magic embedded in an artist’s original work that causes people to be
attracted to an original and its reproductions. It is that magic
and a collector’s desire to experience it again and again in the privacy
of their home that hopefully makes them want to buy it. Anything
(including ideas born of stifling marketing techniques or a printer’s
laziness) that dilutes or stands in the way of a reproduction evidencing
that magic risks making it ring untrue to the artist’s intent. The more
magnificent the reproductions; the more of them that are out there
putting the artist’s “best foot forward” the more likely someone will
happen along; someone who can afford the original and who only buys
originals, who will think to themselves, “Wow, if the print
is that powerful, what must the original look like?”
And
then, they seek out the artist and the original.
This has happened and
continues to happen when people see our
VirtualOriginals™. I recently
sold a $10,000.00 original oil to a client, whom I have yet to meet and
who never saw the original until after he paid for it and it
arrived in Houston, TX. He based his decision solely on his impression of
the painting conveyed by its print. And, yes, he was thrilled when he
received the original; so much for quality prints debasing the value of
an original.
The markets for
expensive originals and quality Giclées are separate and distinct and do
not intrude upon nor compete with one another; except in the
minds of those types whose self-image and ego are flattered by being
able to brag that they are the only person in the world who has this or
that object of beauty in captivity; I mean in his or her possession.
How many
artists do you print for and
why did you get into this business?
I
personally represent a small number of artists, which is a fact dictated
by time, choice and practicality - there is only so much time in a day.
However, our printing services - for both original painting
reproductions and photography are available to anyone who appreciates
the quality of what we have to offer. I also am planning to devote a
portion of our website to marketing the prints and/or originals of those
for whom we have produced VirtualOriginals™
- with permission of course. One good turn deserves another.
I
only set out seeking what seemed at one point was becoming the "Holy
Grail" of prints after deciding – by trying out various
giclée providers who were supposed to be among the best - that the only
way I was going to achieve the quality of prints I wanted was to have complete control. At that time, I had no
interest nor thought of offering the service to others.
Since that time the conclusion I've come to, and what has prompted me to
offer our VirtualOriginal™ process to others, is that when people see what we
are able to achieve they tend to ask if we can do it for them. And so,
we have opened ourselves up to producing works for others. Once you know
how to do something its not that hard to ramp up for greater production
capacity – it’s the figuring out the formula in the first place that’s
the killer!
How did you gain knowledge of digital
printing?
By seeking out the best people; working with and
learning from them and ultimately developing a set of guidelines and
protocols that yielded the results that were our goal.
What should an artist consider when
deciding whether to buy or hire a printer?
They should ask themselves what their goal is. Do they
want to be an artist or a printer? Yes, it seems like it would be a
marriage made in heaven – you make the art, print the art, sell the art
and keep all the money. I suppose some people can do it all. Should they
though is the question?
My feeling is that the knowledge needed to print at
the highest levels is simply too overwhelming for any artist, seriously
pursuing their art, to waste their time on. The time they would loose
from producing art while fighting to learn a complex set of printing
skills could even sidetrack their career and delay attaining mastery of
their style. There is also the question of whether the effort will yield
them any real financial gain; not to mention they could – inadvertently
– end up denying their collectors exceptional reproductions of their
works.
What unforeseen challenges are common
when an artist buys a printer?
Too numerous almost to mention – but I’ll take a shot
– Who will scan your paintings and how? The entire process begins with
the scan – garbage in, garbage out; this cannot be emphasized too
strongly. What inks will you use; the printer manufacturer’s or third
party inks? How much color gamut do the inks have? Do they even have the
ability to generate the vibrant colors, the rich blacks, etc needed to
reproduce your art? (Not a small problem). Will you use the
printer manufacturer’s software that is wedded inextricably to their
printer, their inks, their papers and their canvases or will you buy a
RIP (to be read expensive third party software that
precisely translates the edited, proofed RGB file into CMYK so your
printer can use it and hopefully print it out the way you want); what
papers/canvases will you use; what D-Max do they have; do they have
optical brighteners added; if so, how will this affect your colors –
short/long term?
What coatings will you use? Water based or solvent based ones; do you know how to apply them and have a place to
apply them; and how do they react with the canvas/paper you have chosen?
(Some will literally wash away the image) What monitor will you buy? If
you want a good monitor be prepared to spend around $3,000.00 to get
into the realm that has the ability to do the job right. Of course,
that is assuming you know how to profile the monitor to your
printer and sync it up with your software (RIP) so that what you are
seeing on the monitor is actually what prints out. Do you understand
color spaces like Adobe 1998, Colormatch, Pro Photo, etc and when to or
when not to use them? Would you know how to profile the inks you are
using to canvases or papers you use that are not on a
manufacturer’s list of approved papers or canvases; the ones they
make and sell and hope you will use with their printer/paper/canvas/ink
specific software profiles. The list goes on, and on and on. Are we
having fun yet?
Even though I have an excellent grasp of the process
and how all the factors interrelate, I could not sit down and run the
equipment and have the slightest hope of yielding for myself or you
VirtualOriginals™. That is why I have
heading up my production team one of the best individuals in the field
in the country; who does know all the ins and outs.
Is the printmaker going to get more out
of the technology than an artist who buys the equipment and tries to do
it for himself/herself?
Ask yourself this question and you will have your
answer. Which is more likely to be reliable? The medical advice of an
M.D. who has devoted his life to medicine or a self-diagnosis you make
on yourself based on a book you happened to pick up in a bookstore? Fine
art print making is a profession, not a hobby.
What other knowledge do printmakers have
through experience that self-printing artists might not have?
They have the ability to bring to bear levels of experience and
understanding upon issues and/or problems that no one doing it as a
neophyte could hope to possess. The reason we call people professionals
is because they have the ability to solve in the twinkling of an eye
problems that amateurs wouldn’t even know how to define well enough to
ask an intelligent question about – much less solve.
The artist should view their printmaker as an extension of their
artist’s skills; someone who will be able to listen to what the artist
wants to achieve and then – without the artist having to even trouble
thinking about it have the printmaker do the job right.
What is the major difference in
technology between printing photos versus paintings?
The technology remains the same; the printing media
usually is paper – though canvas can be used. What you are
printing is not the real concern but the destination; it is the way you
configure your various options for specific situations to best realize
the intent of the artist’s work that is the variable bear you must
always wrestle. It’s always the same but different.
Here is the important point to keep in
mind,
the key to producing a true work of art and a superb giclée is not
just having all the handy dandy ingredients handy; but rather
the ability to know how to combine those ingredients creatively,
intelligently, technically and artistically in a way that transports the
work beyond ordinary to extraordinary. Seeking mediocrity or “close, but
no cigar” has little honor nor excitement attached to it in my opinion. |
