The answer is…

Whatever works for you, your images and your market! Each image must be looked at on its merit and a decision made based on what would be the best outcome for you. Here are some points to consider and our thoughts on which direction we might head if it were our image…

• The image is of a high standard and with a broad market appeal – Go limited with higher numbers, perhaps 100-250 on an archival paper or canvas product.
• The image is of a high standard but with narrow market appeal – Go limited with lower numbers, perhaps 25-50 on an archival paper or canvas product.
• The image has great appeal to the mass market but price is a factor – Go Open and choose a non-archival product for cost effectiveness.

The important thing to consider here is that you do what’s right for you. You need to look at where you want to position yourself in the market. Do you treat your art as a business or is it a hobby. If you consider yourself to be in business and art is your sole source of income then obviously you would consider all avenues open to you.

Some artists believe that they’ve created an original and it should remain an individual and unique product. That’s fine if it works for them and they can paint enough and sell enough to live the lifestyle that suits them.

Then there are those artists who are more marketing gurus than simple painters. They believe that images should be painted to service not just one market but be used in many forms to create multiple streams of income such as prints, cushion covers, cups, placemats etc.

Which way is right? Is selling your images via mass marketing in multiple product types selling out to the artist’s code? Is limiting your income through refusing to be involved in reproduction in any form the smart thing to do?

Consider this example – Let’s look at the humble hamburger. Whether you buy from the corner take-away or a large franchise like Macdonald’s you get a bun with some meat and salad. The corner store is into supplying one off custom made burgers for each person that walks through the door. The franchise says “here is our menu board, we’ve got 36 different burgers for you to choose from and they’ll be ready in 45 seconds because we’ve precooked all the meat and have a team of young, enthusiastic workers ready to toss salad in the direction of the bun and then chuck it into the microwave for a burst of radiation so you can enjoy your burger quicker!”

Both concerns provide an edible product but one sells thousands more hamburgers. But what both do is service a market and both promote their product in different ways.

You, as an artist who only does originals, can only display one original in one gallery. But you as an artist who offers reproductions can offer one original in one gallery and 100 reproductions in 100 other outlets or sell the rights to an image to be used thousands of times by someone else or turn the images into curtain material or tiles or placemats or mugs or books. The choice is yours.