Giclee prints are big news in the USA. In the fine art business they have taken over from lithographs and screen prints as the dominant and preferred way for artists, galleries and publishers to make reproductions and prints. The growth in the American giclee market has been phenomenal while the traditional print methods have stagnated. It has been reported that something like 80% of new images in the US are being produced using giclee techniques.

The technology behind this revolution is based on the power of computers combining with advances in printing techniques. Extremely fine droplets of ink can be spurted onto heavy water-colour paper or artists canvas. These droplets can be controlled by computer so that the resolution of the printed image is much finer than conventional printing. The image and printer commands are recorded as a digital file and can be accessed on demand. This means that an edition can be proofed and then tested for popularity. Then when the artist, gallery or publisher wishes to print more copies of the image they can be produced as and whenever needed.

The first giclee machine was an Iris printer. Iris printers print on a drum which revolves at high speed. This means that the size of the drum dictates the maximum size of paper or canvas, which has to be flexible to fix around the drum. In fact the maximum size is about 34 inches by 46 inches.

Early giclee prints were found to be fugitive which meant that the inks faded quickly when exposed to sunlight. In the last couple of years the lightfastness problem has been solved by the use of much more stable ink-sets and specially coated papers and canvas. A second generation of giclee printers are able to use pigmented inks which are extremely stable, with the paper being fed into the printer from a flat bed or from a roll. These later machines can be left to print from a roll unattended which brings down the labour costs.

The original Iris printers are still able to produce high quality images using dye based inks which are finer and have a wider colour gamut. However the Iris printer is a more expensive machine which needs constant attention.

Overall, the benefits to artists, galleries and publishers are that the quality and print-on-demand features enable more fine art prints to be available. The benefits for collectors are the superb quality, stability and fidelity of giclee prints, and the extra supply from new artist publishers.

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