I individually print every Limited Edition Print.
My printer uses a special ink spray process developed exclusively for
fine art printing. These pigment prints offer great advantages in
beauty, quality and durability. The image is captured and then I refine
it to secure the color balance required. Archival-quality art paper
is then used to create the final art work.
Pigment Inks
The coating used in Smith's prints is a new
pigment type - not dye. It withstands light and humidity better than
dyes. My prints will last from 100 to
200 years or longer while maintaining its original colors. These images are
projected to last longer than the finest photographic images currently
available. They also resist fading 10 times longer than the inks used
in Iris prints or other inkjet prints.
New Standard
Pigment prints are on
their way to becoming a new printing standard. Many
museums have mounted exhibitions or purchased this type of print for their permanent
collections including The Metropolitan Museum (New York), the Guggenheim (New York), the Museum of Fine Arts (Boston), the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum (Boston), the Philadelphia Museum, the Butler Institute (Youngstown, OH), the Corcoran (DC), the National Gallery for Women in the Arts (DC), the Kennedy Center for Performing Arts (DC), the Walker Art Center, the Smithsonian Institution Libraries, the New York Public Library Print Collection, the High Museum (Atlanta), the California Museum of Photography, the National Museum of Mexico and the San Jose Museum, among others.
Famous Artists
Many well known
artists also include pigment prints in their original works, multiple
originals or beautiful reproductions including Robert Rauschenberg, Jim
Dine, David Hockney and Andrew and Jamie Wyeth.
Fast Growing
This type of print
is by far the fastest growing segment of the art market, increasing at
over 60% per year.
Compare to Lithographs
and Serigraphs
Pigment prints
have many advantages over lithographs and serigraphs. Offset lithographs
are created by taking a continuous tone image and processing it through a
screen. The result is an image created with a series of dots, each one
proportional in size to the density of the original. The eye is
consequently "tricked" into seeing something that approximates a
continuous tone image. Newspapers and magazines are examples of this
process.
Serigraphs are screen
prints. They are produced by making a set of screens, each representing
one color. Ink is then squeezed through the screen and onto the media.
For fine art reproduction purposes, the number of screens, the closer a
serigraph can appear to be a continuous tone and the more expensive to
produce.
Pigment
Prints = Unlimited Color
In contrast to
these processes, the color in pigment prints is virtually unlimited. Therefore, literally millions of colors are
available and the limitation imposed by the screening process does not
exist. The pigment printing process uses such small dots and so many of them that
they are not discernible to the eye. A pigment print is essentially a
continuous tone print showing every color and tonal nuance.
II individually print each
print to a uniform high standard using specially selected art
paper.
Special order
prints are available up to 42" wide by 72" long.
Special Editions
Some of Ry Smith's images are
hand-embellished or hand-coated to achieve special effects. These are
often limited to "One-of-a-kind" and can best be compared to a monotype,
defined as a "unique piece of artwork".
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