GREENWICH
WORKSHOP FINE ART REPRODUCTION TECHNIQUES.
With
so many new and innovative art reproduction
techniques available, you may find it difficult
to understand how one differs from another,
and to feel confident making a selection. We
have compiled this online guide to help you
better understand the various reproduction
techniques we choose to best replicate original
works of art.
OFFSET
LITHOGRAPHIC PRINTS
This
process affordably allows more people to own
and enjoy a work of art than the original painting
would. Offset lithography is a photographic printing
technique that useslinks, carried by rubber rollers
called printing blankets, to transfer images
from metal plates to paper. Not all prints are
alike, however, even at the same price. Our links
and archival paper are specially made to our
exacting specifications. While the industry for
offset lithograph prints is often only four colors,
we routinely create Greenwich Workshop fine art
prints in as many as eighteen different colors,
resulting in unmatched clarity and color fidelity
to the original.
The paper upon which Greenwich Workshop prints are produced is a custom-made,
neutral-pH sheet. The paper is designed for whiteness and brilliance, as well
as longevity: in accelerated life testing by the mill, the paper has shown
it can last not just for years, but for centuries.
When you purchase a Greenwich Workshop limited edition print, please be certain
that only conservation framing techniques are used to preserve the quality
and value of your investment. Choose non-reflective conservation glass and
acid-free matting. Likewise, be certain that no alteration, such as cutting
or trimming, is done to your print in the mounting process. Finally, take precautions
as to where you hang the print; avoid direct sunlight or proximity to sources
of room heat.
TEXTURED
CANVAS PRINTS
Greenwich Workshop textured canvas prints—such as Howard Terpning's Opening
the Sacred Bundle—are published on a very selective basis. This unique
and valuable technique replicates the look and feel of an original painting,
including canvas texture and, at times, artist's brush strokes. The image
is first printed by offset lithography with oil-based inks on a thin piece
of
oil-based material. A mold of the original painting can be used as a guide
to create a feeling of brush strokes, or the artist can re-create the brush
strokes. The mold is used with heat and pressure to bond the printed image
to the artist-quality canvas. The resulting fine art print captures the
texture as well as the image of the original and is framed without glass.
No
canvas transfers!
Canvas transfer has become a generic term that is not the standard by which
Greenwich Workshop canvas should be referred. Most transfers are a chemical
process by which inks are lifted from the original medium (usually paper) to
another (canvas). Most inks, papers, and printing processes were not designed
for this use so there can be a breakdown in color. We cannot control the image
fidelity and will not put our name on this process.
FINE
ART SERIAGRAPHS
Intimacy by Thomas Blackshear II was produced through the exacting serigraph
process, using more than 120 hand-applied colors. Also commonly known as silk-screening,
serigraphy is a time-honored technique, based on stenciling, for creating prints
by hand. Ink or paint is carefully brushed through a fine fabric screen, portions
of which have been masked for impermeability. For each color, a different portion
of the screen must be masked, and each color must be allowed to dry before
the next is applied. Like Greenwich Workshop fine art lithographs, our fine
art serigraphs are created from an original painting, and the artist can see
and adjust the evolution of the colors through many proofing stages. The depth
of color in the resulting fine art serigraph is almost luminous.
FINE
ART INK JET PRINTS
This technique is also called Iris printing,
after the brand name of a particular
printer, or "giclée." Each
second, the ink-jet printer produces
over four
million droplets of ink that combine
to form more
than two thousand
shades of color. Cheyenne Split Horn Headdress was printed on the same
archival watercolor paper that
Bama used for the original painting
and must be treated
as carefully. Greenwich Workshop fine art ink-jet prints are identified
by the chop marks of the printer
and The Greenwich Workshop.
FINE
ART LITHOGRAPHS
Fine art lithographs are created by hand
in a process that dates back to the 18th
century and is the origin of the modern
offset lithographic process. A
separate plate is used to print each color (thirty-three in the case of
Summer Mist) and each plate is
hand-drawn by the artist or a chromiste.
The plates
are printed one at a time and each color is allowed to dry before the next
one is printed, giving the artist an opportunity to see how the colors
are building and to make changes,
if necessary. A Greenwich Workshop "fine
art" lithograph is published from an original painting; an "original" lithograph
is created directly on the plates, without an original painting as a guide.
This distinction is not overlooked by The Greenwich Workshop.
