Limited edition print

It has become a popular décor trend lately to decorate ones Cape luxury accommodation with South Art. Unfortunately not all art lovers can afford the luxury of an original South African painting or sculpture while others simply don’t have the space in their Cape Town apartments to accommodate a large work.

A good solution to this problem is to start ones art collection with a limited edition print. A print can be a lithograph, etching, monotype or even a photograph.

The definition of a limited edition is a print that is part of a set printed in a limited number, usually fewer than 80. At the bottom of the page the print will be marked with a set of numbers, for example 3/25. The 25 refers to the number of prints in the edition, the 3 means that this is the third print of which only 25 will be printed. Artist’s proofs are also sold, they are marked with an A/P, this is the print that all of the other prints in the edition are measured against. There is also a workshop proof (W/P) and printer’s proof (P/P).

Photographs can be sold in different editions according to their size, so an edition of 10 prints of an image for example, can be sold again in another edition if the photographs size has been enlarged.

The artist can sell the remaining unsold prints in an edition for more than the other prints as they will be worth more to the buyer. For example if an artist has an edition of twelve of which ten are sold, he can charge more for the remaining two as they are more in demand.

There are many distinguished and emerging artists in South Africa, be sure to start collecting some of their work for your Cape accomodation  today.