PRICING OF ARTWORK
(a general guide with lots of exceptions.)
The retail price of my artwork is generally calculated at $225.00 per square foot. Therefore, a 12" x 12" would be around $225.00 unframed and a 24" x 24" would cost about $900.00 unframed. A mathematic formula for calculating this is as follows:
width x height = xxxxxxx (divided by) 144 = xxxxx (sq. ft. amount of artwork) x 225 (price) =
___________ Estimated Cost of Artwork
For example, a piece of artwork that is 23 ½" x 54" would be priced as follows:
23.5 x 54 = 1269 (divided by 144) = 8.8125 (sq. ft.) x 225.00 = 1,982.8725
(144 is the number of square inches in a square foot.)
This means that this artwork would be priced around $2,000.00. Most of the time this represents the highest price it would be. If I made a piece of artwork out of a lot of pure 23k gold leaf and used only papers that cost $50.00 per sheet, I would charge the higher amount.
Most artwork is reduced down from this figure, sometimes up to 25%.
The factors that influence this reduction are:
(1) Modular piecework and repetitive piecework which allows me to work faster,
(2) Commissions generally take longer as I have to find or make specific colors and or blocks. Work that is done for inventory and on speculation goes much faster because it does not have these restrictions. I have 20 years worth of paper collected and over 1,000 silk patterns and colors. Sometimes it takes me hours to find a piece of it which was purchased 18 years ago.
(3) Imagery which I am familiar with goes much faster than doing a new pattern or block for the first time.
(4) Constructing something a certain size is difficult. The paper stretches as well as the silk. Drawings to scale quite often don't turn out to scale and must be adjusted. I generally target a size and then do my best to keep it "around" that size. I do not charge more if it is larger than the targeted size.
(5) Framing considerations and stock matt board sizes can be important when determining the size. Matt board is either 32" x 40" or 40" x 60". It can be joined if you don't mind a small seam in the middle. My artwork is often mounted on linen or silk glued to foamboard.
COMMISSIONS
SAMPLES FOR COMMISSIONS - GENERAL INFORMATION Whenever I make a commission for a client I have 25 years collection of papers and silks to choose from. I can generally pull out at least ten samples of each color in your pallet. I generally go for a variety of textures and types of papers, silks and metals leafs. This year I have started painting on papers to get new metallic and custom papers. If I don't have it I will make it or I will make the painted papers that tie the whole piecework together. Choose the papers during daylight for the best indication of their true colors and look at them in nighttime artificial light in the room that the art will be framed and hung. I will try to include a printout of a piece of artwork which is similar to your commission so you can see (more or less) what yours will be like and what you need to choose. I have to have some flexibility in where the papers go when I am sewing. I believe part of the beauty of my quilts is the variety of the materials in them, just like the traditional quilts that grandma used to make. In choosing from the samples I send you, put as many as you can in the "favorites" pile. Take two baggies and make one the "like" one and the other your rejects. I will use as many of the ones you select and may add a few more that I have forgotten to send that fit in. I generally do not send too many blacks, whites and solids in colors as I add them by pattern, there isn't much choice in selecting those colors generally. I may sew together some blocks for you to choose from so you get a better idea how the colors work with each other. You may choose the whole block or you may lightly mark in pencil on the back of the piece with a checkmark if you want that piece included in the final design. Map Commissions that are all silk and do not have to be framed, and art quilts start at $200.00 per square foot. Dimensional Quilts (or as I call them "Quilts on Stilts") start around $250.00 per square foot.