wallets and whose voice is being heard loud and clear within

the market.

Artists no longer have to worry about a single

exhibition or single critic making or breaking their careers.

The careers of appreciated artists grow in support everyday

as new collectors come to discover their work, take it home

and find it is something they enjoy. Those artists embraced

by the public are able to enjoy the fruits of their labor and

don't have to wait for their death to be recognized.

This renaissance has been made possible by

computers and the ability to reproduce artwork digitally.

High definition photographs and print-on-demand have also

gone a long way towards aiding in the price reduction for

artwork. In earlier times if an artist wanted to create a

series they would have to pay a reproduction house,

whether it was for etchings, lithographs, or serigraphs, the

cost for the entire series up front. Even decades ago an

investment like this could reach the tens or hundreds of

thousands of dollars. This was a practice only the most

successful artists and publishers could afford.

You will hear a lot of critics and gallery owners who

claim to be purists declaring, "if it's not an original, then it's

not really worth noticing." To them I say, "If this is the

case, then you are limiting your own market and limiting the

entire art market to maybe less than 1/2 of 1% of the

population who can start to afford 30, 40 or 50 thousand

dollars for just one painting on their wall." I think this is a

very elitist point of view and inherently flawed because it

would be tremendously unfortunate if a person falls in love

with an artwork and can't have it because the real issue is

the price of the work.

A reproduction, as long as it has true fidelity to the

quality of the original work, is a great thing. It allows a