Editioning .... worthless...

     Although not a photographic limited edition in the world of graphic
art collecting the term limited "edition" has basically become a useless
meaningless word. Much of the so called limited edition market for the
collector and investor has been destroyed and may never fully recover.
       How this happened is that graphic publishers at one time issued a "
limited edition of usually 250 to 400 prints.. The collectors ( many of
them investors) would base the value and expenditure for a print typically
at $250 to $600 on that low numbered " edition" as being relatively unique
it the world and would be considered possibly a good investment from a
noted artist......
      Times have dramatically changed that market ... A common practice now
is that at the beginning of a so called " Limited Edition" a publisher
will
send a " sample print" to all the participating galleries for
display....In the US this number is considerable... It is then stated , as a
example , that on the first day of January 2004 the " Limited edition "
will open. The "limited " edition will then close 30 or 90 days
latter.....
      Because of this practice the edition would sometimes go into the
thousands.......The collector investor all of a sudden was paying $250 to
$600 for a print with a number of 3526! The investor collector then began
to back out of this market....
John Cremati
Received on Sun Jul 4 04:12:31 2004