What is Giclee?

Giclee is the the newest standard in Fine Art Printmaking. The name Giclee (pronounced "zhee-clay") is derived from the French verb "gicler" meaning 'to spray' or 'to squirt'. A Giclee print is a high-resolution, high fidelity, archival quality digital print produced on a special large format printer and is a recognized fine art print category just like lithographs and serigraphs. With the arrival of the digital age this has created a whole new vibrant medium for art.

Giclees are superior to traditional lithography in nearly every way. The colors are brighter, last longer, and are so high-resolution that they are virtually 'continuous tone', rather than tiny dots. The range, or "gamut" of color for giclees is far beyond that of lithography, and details are crisper. Lithography uses tiny dots of four colors--cyan, magenta, yellow and black--to fool the eye into seeing various hues and shades. Colors are "created" by printing different size dots of these four colors. Giclee prints are created typically using professional 8-Color to 12-Color ink-jet printers. These modern technology printers are capable of producing incredibly detailed prints for the fine art markets. The process employs lightfast (fade resistant,) pigmented inks and finer, more numerous, replaceable print heads resulting in a wider color gamut. The ink is sprayed onto the canvas, actually mixing the color on the canvas to create truer shades and hues. Giclee prints are sometimes mistakenly referred to as Iris prints, which are 4-Color ink-jet prints from a printer pioneered in the late 1970s by Iris Graphics.

Giclees were originally developed as a proofing system for traditional lithographic printing presses, but it soon became apparent that the presses were having a hard time delivering the quality and brilliant color of the giclee proofs. The quality of the giclee print rivals traditional silver-halide and gelatin printing processes and they are commonly found in museums, art galleries, and photographic galleries. They are coveted by collectors for their fidelity and quality.

Why should I buy from Eternal Art Gallery?

• Quality: We use the highest quality __ ink printers available for large format printing. Our printers are optimized with inks that are specifically intended for use in fine art printing, which is to say we use archival pigmented inks, not dye based inks often found in most printers. Independent third party laboratories associated with the fine art industry have tested giclees for longevity and we can assure a life span of 75-150 years. We use the smallest spray nozzles available anywhere, spraying a fine stream of pigmented inks (more than four million droplets per second) onto fine art archival grade canvas to insure the highest quality fine art giclees.

• Prices: We sell our fine art a a fraction of what you'd expect to pay elsewhere and we give volume discounts.
   
• Guarantee: We guarantee all of our products constantly thriving to exceed your expectations.
   
• Reputation: Our Fine Art can be found in galleries world wide.

Do you deal with commercial accounts?

Yes. We work with a number of Interior Design firms and Galleries globally. We would love to discuss how we could best help achieve your project goals while providing the very best in wholesale pricing.