Selling Art Prints - mounts and barrier boards?

September 23, 2024 2:42 PM

I've got some prints of my original art work that I'm selling at markets etc. Looking for advice on presentation.

I gather that it's a decent investment to sell them mounted. I've found an online shop for mounts but I assume I'll need to order barrier boards separately ... do I buy barrier boards to be the exactly the size of the mount and then glue it on or what? I know I need to tape the art to the mount but the backing is getting me confused... I want to number and sign the back ... advice for how to go about this and links to companies to buy from would both be appreciated, thanks :)

posted by an opinicus to Media & Arts (2 answers total)

A large part of how and where to buy materials is going to depend on volume. Are you selling 5-10 prints per month, or a couple hundred?

I used to run a digital print shop, and a big part of what we did was fine arts repro. Big flatbed scanner; we'd take original paintings, scan & color-correct them, and then produce a variety of products for our artists. Note cards, bookmarks, and a whole lot of giclee prints on watercolor paper or rag paper.

Almost universally, our artists sold their prints unmounted; it was the print + a sheet of 3/16" foamcore, in a clear poly envelope. We did enough volume, that I ordered foamcore by the pallet direct from the manufacturer, and ordered cases and cases of foamcore pre-cut to 8x10 and 11x14, our two most common print sizes. Some artists paid us extra to package for them (as above, art print + foamcore in a poly envelope), but we also sold the foamcore and poly envelopes separately, and many artists did it themselves. Presenting the prints this way allows them to be easily browsed by customers, while keeping them flat, rigid, and free of fingerprints.

We took care to always wear gloves when loading & unloading rolls of paper, trimming, handling, and packaging prints, and handling foamcore and materials. Stuff's only acid-free and archival as long as you don't touch it; once you get skin oils on it, after a few years it's going to start to discolor where it was touched. So, packaging prints this way gives the customer an easy way to safely transport it to a frame shop for framing, or keep it protected until they drop it into a ready-made frame themselves. Most of our artists dropped a business card in with the print, usually at the back, with their contact info and basic precautions for safe handling.

In the US, Clearbags is a decent source for the poly envelopes, for low-volume users. Take a close look at their pricing; it can make a lot of sense to buy in bulk, especially if perhaps you can split an order with someone else. If your prints aren't already all the same size (or just a couple of standardized sizes), you might want to consider that in the future. Ask around at local frame shops what the most popular sizes in your range are, and consider standardizing your prints toward those sizes. It will generally make it a lot easier and cheaper to find packaging materials for just one or a few sizes, rather than each unique piece being a custom one-off.

If you're doing canvas prints and want to do your own mounted wraps, the GOframe system is really easy to get into, but again the pieces are sold in certain lengths, so unless you want to stock a ton of sizes, it really makes sense to standardize into a few sizes.
posted by xedrik at 4:21 PM on September 23 [8 favorites]

I'm not really clear what you are talking about when you say mounted. Do you mean matted? Like this? How you present work very much depends on what kind of art you are selling. Work on paper is usually matted. I ordinarily mat artwork I sell at markets. You can buy precut mats, boards and bags at Amazon - I've used a couple different vendors and never had an issue. I use acid free tape to tape the art to the mat itself and do not tape anything to the backing board. The frame or the bag will hold it in place. The backing board is the same size as the exterior dimensions of the mat. Ideally, print your work to fit standard sizes so the customer can just pop them in a standard frame. Custom frames are $$$.

There are entire screeds written on how to sign artwork. For prints it is customary to sign it in the margin / border at the bottom with the number of the print on the left - the number would be something like 3/20, which means that you are only running 20 prints and this is the third one off the press - the title in the center and the signature on the right. That is old school and would really only be for things like lithographs or woodcuts where you have a clear idea how many prints you are going to run. You can always put A/P which means Artists' Proof or just leave it blank. If you are signing it on the back you need to be sure it doesn't show through and don't use anything that might degrade the work over time. Sharpie, for example, will mess up a gelatin silver darkroom print, sigh. I sign works on paper in pencil and I think that's pretty usual.
posted by mygothlaundry at 4:27 PM on September 23 [1 favorite]