PAINTING over GICLEE ???

PAINTING over GICLEE print ???

I never dealt personally with giclee (there was no need for that before). But finally I need to print few.

We know that sometimes giclee prints come out with wrong colour rendering or contrast defects etc. Here a situation may arise when it'd be necessary to correct problems: i.e. to touch canvas here and there with brush & paint.

- Is there any need to prepare giclee surface for that? - Is there any need to cover print lightly with varnish or something (to protect print itself and to provide toothing?) - What should be done (if anything)?

FOR BOTH situations: 1) just for few PAINT touch-ups here and there? or 2) for painting the whole picture OVER GICLEE print?

I mean OIL PAINT, not acrylic.

Thank you.

Weaving the Conundrum

Assuming it's printed with ink, you probably are better off using similar ink for touch-ups. That having been said, you might want to visit a Thos Kincaid Center and see how they do the 'highlighting' on prints they sell of his works. I've never been to one of their outlets so don't know the answer.

Seems that nobody is using GICLEE prints ? Hmmm.

There were so many followers of new technology/equipment in visual arts, but when it comes to common thing as giclee, nobody is around to support it.

Nobody wants to share few secrets about working with GICLEE prints ?

Weaving the Conundrum

I have seen lots of giclees around, and some are 'hand-embellished'. So painting over them is common but I think it's usually in acrylics. I wouldn't trust them for oils - they're not primed and the oil could easily sink in and rot (or not sink in and peel off). If you have a printer that uses archival inks, and there aren't many, you could print directly on something like Fredrix canvas made for printers and then you'd know it's a primed surface.

I don't make reproductions of my work personally, so can't tell from firsthand experience. Sorry.

If you have access to your own printer, I would try coating a small sample print with clear gesso... Either roll it on, or spray it - brushing it might work, but if you work too much on one spot, you might end up taking the ink off.

leave it plenty of time to dry, the solvents might make your print run...

I use gesso on the back of prints done on an epson printer - it gives them a nice bounce when stretched... i've tried it with "giclees" done on an hp, but unless they dry COMPLETELY, the image rubs off like a gelatine coating...

I have never worked with oil before, but i read gesso is used as base for both acrylic and oil painting...

Alternatively, you could look into Golden Paints - Mix more media substrates - they are a complete system for mixing various media as print surfaces - to let you mix media - i guess they'd tell you how to combine it with oil paints and other stuff, there are lots of resources on their web and you can buy the paint at curry's art stores for example...

This is pretty neat advise, Kare. Thanks so much. I hope Linda2 will read this soon