The history of giclee

In the late 1980s, the iris3047 continuous inkjet drum printer was mainly used in prepress digital proofing. At the time, the price of an iris3047 printer was $126,000, and the dye inks used were also very faint. But its fine continuous output capability has attracted the attention of the pioneers of digital high-end output such as Grahamnash (Founder of Nasheditions), and has finally achieved a huge market for the reproduction of works of art and photo printing for collectors.

Grahamnash purchased an iris3047 and immediately improved it and used a more lightfast ink to begin outputting high-quality photos. In 1991, Jackduganne, a copy maker of American art, used the French word “giclee” to describe the process of making collection-level artworks. This new name can also be used in general households. Commercial inkjet printing produces differences. Since then giclee has been widely accepted in the global art community and the photography community.

Because of the poor quality of the ink used in the earlier giclee, some art reproduction companies began to add some words in front of giclee to promote their higher quality and longer storage time such as trugiclee and heritagegiclee. Of course they must use specified inks and media to achieve long-term preservation.

Epson (USA) also began to promote ultragiclee artwork reproduction technology in 2004 - Must use Epson pigment ink printer, Epson pigment ink ("Century Iridescent k3" pigment ink, "Century Iridescent" pigment ink, "Century Iridescent Brightness" pigment ink Or "Century Color" pigment inks and three designated acid-free cotton media (Epson Super Smooth Art Paper, Epson Texture Art Paper, Epson Waterproof Canvas). The trained art reproduction center or museum can even issue an ultragiclee certificate for the work. The Epson (USA) company guarantees that it will not fade in 80 years, otherwise it will pay 100 US dollars per square foot. Ultragiclee is the first project in the world to provide compensation for the reproduction of artworks. The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and the Boston Museum of Art also began selling art replicas of the ultragiclee process.

Because the Chinese market has no deep understanding of the above foreign collection-level output, it still remains at the low end of the “inkjet” and “photorealistic” concept. Epson (China) Co., Ltd. hopes to promote and popularize giclee in China, so it translates giclee into "art micro-spray," hoping that Chinese artists and photographers have a deeper understanding of this.

Art micro-spraying works are generally priced between original works and limited-edition works printed using traditional printing techniques. The limited number of traditional printing process printing is generally 500 to 1000, while the limited number of art micro-spraying process is generally 50 to 100 pieces. The on-demand production of the advantages of the art micro-spraying process is only made after receiving the order, without cost savings.

New York City Phillips Auction Company auctioned the artist's art micro-spray on April 23, 2004. Annieleibovitz's art micro-shots sold a total of $10,800, chuckclose's art micro-sprayed photo of $9,600, and wolfgangtillmans's art micro-jet photo of $22,800. .

In addition to the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Boston Museum of Art, which began selling art replicas of the art micro-spray process, the Beijing National Palace Museum, the National Library of China, the National Palace Museum in Taipei, the Pennsylvania Museum of Art, the Guggenheim Museum in New York, and the Los Angeles Contemporary Art Museums, the Cocoa Gallery in Washington, the Louvre Museum in Paris, France, and the world-renowned museums and galleries such as the British Museum in London, England also sell art micro-jets.

According to the forecast of the city's survey and research consultancy, Itstrategies, the sales volume of global art micro-jets in 2005 was as high as 750 million U.S. dollars.

Source: Qilu Graphic Arts