This is a description of how this gallery operates from the artist point of view. Hopefully it will answer all your questions if you are thinking of contacting us about showing your art at the Feather Gallery. This description outlines the process for the digital artist; the process is similar for the traditional artist but less complicated.
The art buyer may find this of interest as well; we will cover a few key aspects of the gallery operation that we hope sets us apart from other online galleries dealing with digital art. We want to make sure the art sold here is treated with the respect it deserves.
Pre-processing
The fist step, assuming we are happy to show your work, is for you to send us a production quality sample of your work in a suitable colour space, resolution, and format. It can either be an entire work or just a snippet postcard size section. We will use this sample to do a number of printing tests with professional printers. This serves two purposes - first, we can check the quality ourselves and solve any problems using the format you supplied and secondly, we can send you a hardcopy of the printed result so you can check that it meets your standards as well.
Once the printing process and formats have been settled upon, the next step is for you to supply low resolution copies of your art ready to be rendered inside the gallery for the exhibition. At this stage, some thought has to go into the desired size of the finished printed artwork. Apart from size restrictions due to the resolution or your work, it can be any size you wish, as long as we can find a large enough printer to handle it. This matters as we will render the framed picture at its intended size within the gallery.
Pricing and Commission
While the rendering is being taken care of, there will be a chance to discuss the best way to sell the art. Options include; one-offs or ‘limited edition’ prints, the art can be sold at auction, at a fixed price or sold in a combination of all of the above! However, initially we want to stick to selling the art by auction as much as possible. When sold by auction, you will have an opportunity to set a starting price for each artwork; however, you should bare in mind the following.
We will take a commission of 10% off the price paid for the artwork itself. This brings us to another important point. We pass on the printing, framing and shipping costs directly to the buyer. The actual winning-bid amount is that which is the artist is paid, minus our 10% commission. The buyer will be presented with all this information at the time of bidding or buying the art work, including our best estimate of printing, framing and shipping costs. Once they have won the auction, or committed to buying a work, they will pay the total of the bid amount, printing costs, framing cost and shipping costs. These factors should be taken into account when setting a price to sell the art at, as it can become expensive for the buyer.
Printing
Whether or not all the works are going to be sold at the end of the exhibition might decide how the printing process will work, you’ll see why in a moment. One of the key requirements for the Feather Gallery is getting the work personally signed by the artist. This can handled one of two ways. Probably the best way is to wait until after the auction or exhibition has finished, at which time only the artwork that has been sold, need be printed.
Once printed, the artwork is then sent off to the artist to be personally signed. After that the artwork is returned to the gallery for framing and shipping to the customer. Even though this does involve a bit of ‘back-and-forth’ posting, we want to maintain quality control over the finished product. We think an important part of that is to manage the framing and shipping of the signed artwork from here.
In other situations it may be better to have the paper signed prior to printing. This might be a useful option in the case of numbered prints, where prints may be sold over a longer period of time, even after the exhibition has ended, (but still viewable). In that instance we would send the artist a bundle of high quality paper to be signed prior to printing, once signed the paper is returned to the gallery, where the printing is done over time as required.
Whichever method is used, we will also include a discreet insignia for the Feather Gallery on the periphery of the paper, or on the back. Somewhere that would normally be out of sight once framed.
Optional Extras
In addition to the normal services, there is also the possibility to share your views on your artwork via the (currently intermittent) podcasts. That process will involve a phone call from me and will be something like an interview. We would mainly discuss the works in the exhibition, but also a bit about yourself and anything else you would like to talk about.
The End Result
Our aim at the end of the process is to ship to the customer a unique artwork that has been personally signed by you, printed using the best available technology and properly framed. Giving them a finished artwork they can enjoy on their wall alongside great art from any era, traditional or otherwise.
