Affordable Paintings: Art Prints Buying Guide

admin — Sun, 07 Mar 2010 10:02:27 +0000

The fastest way to bring beauty and style to a
room is to put up prints of beautiful paintings. Here’s what you
should consider:

Painting Prints Price Range:

Expect
to pay somewhere in the neighborhood of $50-$500 for an unframed
print–anything less than $50 is likely a poster. You should
expect to pay a similar amount to have the print framed–note that many
prints are designed to be exhibited without frames.

Before
art prints were sold online, the only way to get them was through
galleries or museum shops, which had to charge a large markup.
Nowadays, art prints rarely cost more than a few hundred dollars, and
it is possible to find good-quality prints for under $100. Still,
those lower prices generally come on prints that have been put on
sale. Expect to pay more for perennial favorites like Van Gogh’s
“Starry Night”.

Selection

There
is at least one print of every painting or photograph on display in a
museum anywhere. Thanks to the internet, you can find the right
art print among the tens of thousands in existence and have it sent to
you, regardless of where the original is located. Since websites
will let you browse thumbnail images of the artwork, it’s easy to find
a particular piece even if all you know about it is the name of the
artist or even just the time period in which it was created.

Painting Print Media

Prints are available in a variety of print stocks.

Prints vs. Original Paintings

If
all you’re interested in is a picture to decorate your wall, rather
than in collecting, prints are a better value than original
paintings. Here’s why:

* Expense.
Creating an original work of art generally takes weeks. If you
had to employ someone for several weeks or several months, how much do
you think it would cost at even a modest salary? That’s why
original artwork generally costs at least thousands of dollars.
In order to have a real chance of your work of art having investment
value, you need to buy the work of an artist who is moving up in the
art market.

* Questionable
investment value. Original artwork only has investment value if
the price goes up eventually. Very often, the price does
not. In short, if you’re interested in investing, buy
stocks–it’s a safer bet. Only buy art because *you* value it.

* Knowledge.
You need to be very knowledgeable about what you are doing. Make
no mistake: there’s plenty of fraud in this business. There is
also plenty of wishful thinking on the part of art dealers when it
comes to a work’s long-term market prospects

Ready
to make your home more beautiful with prints of great paintings?
You’re already in the right place: the internet has numerous websites
offering an unbelievable array of art prints. Start looking now.

By: Joel Walsh

Wildlife Art » Time Period

Affordable Paintings: Art Prints Buying Guide