The Wonderful World of Giclée
Photograph by Phil Harris
The second floor of a Canterbury department store. Rising up from an expanse of three piece suites and coffee tables, a concertina of display panels, crowded with pictures by a handful of artists, each with a signature style and theme.
There are candy-striped cartoon animals; London and Paris skylines in Silly-stringed oils; suns setting and suns rising; a flat capped bloke in a baggy suit repeatedly wobbling away on a sketchy bicycle; glittered monochrome portraits of Twiggy, Kate Moss and Brigitte Bardot;
autographed action 'paintings' 'arttballed' and 'personally hand-signed' by ex England cricket captain Michael Vaughan.
I'm trying to ignore them but they keep catching my attention: two cows then one cow then four cows staring stupidly, one-dimensionally, annoyingly between Magritte-esque men in hats in forests and disembodied torsos and legs and bottoms in scarlet lingerie. In all, a delirious juxtaposition of limited edition giclée prints on boxed canvas.
They're pretty convincing too, these giclées, so nearly like originals. Some of them have even been drizzled with real paint to add extra authenticity. For big spenders, there are limited editions by Dali, he of the signed blank paper scandal, and pastiches of Monets and Van Goghs by convicted art-forger, John Myatt.
There's something for almost every taste, and further examples are featured in a glossy free magazine that showcases the work in fetching architectural settings.
The Washington Green website lists over sixty artists in all. Each is individually profiled: background; working methods. There's a 'day in the life' section, homely codswallop about drinking tea, walking the dog, 'music, that constant friend to wile away the hours' and stuff. They thank their families, their lucky stars, and Glyn Washington, for inspiration, for success, for their idyllic lifestyles.
The prose is purple, peppered with influences:' the Old Masters', Damien Hirst, L.S. Lowry; the pre-Raphaelites, the Mr. Men; pontification on the 'magic that can be created with a paintbrush', that sort of thing. 'Digital print' and 'Reproduction', those dreaded words, are studiously avoided.
A quite different yet eerily similar exhibition can be found in the Artica Gallery, Covent Garden. The cows are there of course, in all their gormlessness. They've proved so popular that they can also be found on limited edition handbags, purses, pill boxes, and cufflinks 'for the fashionista'. Washington Green boast some 150 'Partnership Galleries', great if Déjà vu is your thing.
Naturally, they are preposterously expensive, but art's always expensive, isn't it. A sample 36” x 36” in an edition of 195 might be priced at around £499.99 which clocks up to £97,498.05. Add the original at £4,995, and you've reached a grand total of £102,493.05. Not a bad haul from a single painting.
Mr. Washington, Mr. Green and their team have cooked up quite a phenomenon. Their own bulk art microcosm. They even offer interest free credit.
Phil Harris