Prices of Paintings

I have one 30 cm by 40 cm (1 ft by 1-1/4 ft) picture that I worked months and months on, put away, then worked on more. I value it more for the imaginativeness of the image than its technique.

I have another canvas

says...

Simple. Set a price of so much per square centimeter. That's the way carpet and fabrics are sold, so why not paintings. In fact I've known artists who priced their works just that way.

This gives the artist an incentive to make paintings as large as possible, even if their is no aesthetic or technical justification.

There is an incentive to make paintings as large as possible for moneyreasons, if one square centimeter in a large painting is worth much MORE than one square centimeter in a small painting.

Not so few (among those sold, not stored) larger paintings/sculptures/artworks are bought by/made for corporations, public offices - at least historically, churches and castles - to be displayed in larger rooms.

Yes, but I would say this is the third reason for increased value for large works. The three reasons would be:

1. Paintings are priced by size

2. Wealthy people want to buy big to brag about their wealth and status.

3. Wealthy institutions, such as corporations or churches need larger sizes because they own larger spaces in which to put them, and which they need to fill with appropriately sized works.

That's no problem, I'm pleased if it has helped. Actually it was helping me too to remind myself of the principles again - I have an exhibition opening tonight and I have been getting it all ready, including, of course, pricing, over the last few days. So your question came exactly when my mind was tuned to that particular question!

If anybody happens to be in Cape Town over the next three weeks, by the way, they can see my latest work in Observatory at the Obz Cafe Theatre gallery.

The advice I was given by a gallery owner was that when starting out you should work out the cost of the materials that went into the painting and double it. Then atleast you'll have enough to pay for the next painting. Then you keep on raising the price untill you only sell about half to one third of your pictures. That's supposedly your true market value.

I'm not sure I totally agree with this. People equate cost with quality, and something that costs more is perceived to be better. For example, generic cereals are the same as name brand, yet people will shell out big bucks for Frosted Flakes. If you price your art too low, it can negatively reflect upon your work.

I have a lot more work to do, but I hope to soon start listing some works on ebay. It will be interesting to see how it goes.

In retail sales, it's a well known effect that you can sell more of a cheap item by putting it next to an over-priced deluxe version of the same product by the same manufacturer. So maybe if you just price a few of your art works at outrageously high prices, people will think that you're a really successful artist and will feel better about buying the inexpensively priced ones.

- Bob C.

I would add the obvious fact that sometimes a buyer might not buy a painting because they don't have the space for it, regardless of the price. There are more available places in people's homes for a smaller painting, real estate wise.

I would strongly encourage you NOT to do this. Sometimes I give a painting a go on Ebay:
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem& item=3555243239&categor... 58&rd=1

This person gave me extra money because they felt sorry for me. Ebay keeps jacking up their fees too which bitches me off and makes it impossible to be satisfied with the end result. Put it on your website with a fair price and wait. It may take a year but you won't feel ripped off. I've noticed if you want to compromise your subject matter the following sell on ebay: paintings of unicorns, fairies, or landscapes. 'outsider' art of puppies or cats with primary backgrounds.

The only thing that worked out for me on Ebay was doing inexpensive pencil portraits that I worked on during the commute to work.

Jane