The Business Of Reproducing Famous and Very Expensive Paintings

I love classical paintings. I wish that I can own paintings like the Mona Lisa and other paintings by famous painters like Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci. But alas! I don’t have the money to buy such very expensive paintings.

But I’m not the only person who appreciates old art with a problem like this. Even millionaires with eight digit dollar net worths can’t afford these paintings. If these kinds of millionaires can’t buy these paintings, what about the common person?

Leonardo da Vinci’s most expensive painting and probably the most expensive painting in the world for example, The Mundi, have a reported value of close to half a billion dollars. Let me show this number for greater emphasis: $500,000,000.00.

See the number of zeros in this painting’s price tag? Only a select few people have the money to buy this painting. I doubt if you would even consider buying this painting just to hang it on the wall of your rented apartment.

I’m not being insulting. Americans who are considered the people with the highest purchasing power do only make about $50,000 a year. And this amount is considered already high by many Americans.

Now consider the number of years an average American has to save his annual salary without spending it just to be able to buy Leonardo da Vinci’s painting: 10,000 years. It’s stupendous right? This is how mind boggling expensive a few paintings have become.

What is the alternative to owning a famous painting worth several million dollars? The answer is by owning a reproduction of this painting. It might be a poor alternative, but it’s the only alternative you’ve got.

In fact, there are museums and art galleries who sell print reproductions of the famous and expensive paintings that they own. Not only is this a source of income for them, it also helps them promote their museums and galleries.

And why is this so? Because the reproductions remind their owners that the real painting is out there somewhere. I won’t be surprised if there is a nagging desire for painting reproduction owners to see the real thing.

There are also print reproductions of paintings available online. Just visit your favorite online e-commerce store and you would see plenty of these. The number of available print reproductions is varied enough to suit a lot of painting enthusiasts.

Besides the reproductions being sold at museums and art galleries, there are also companies that offer professional reproduction services. That’s right, there are companies that you can commission to reproduce your favorite painting.

You can find these companies if you wish. All you need to do for example is to Google the search keyword: “companies that reproduce paintings” and you would be shown many companies that do this kind of service.

This question is best answered by the word “Dafen.” But what is Dafen? It is a village in China that is best known for producing 60% of all painting reproductions throughout the world. Imagine, an entire village solely dedicated to painting reproductions of famous paintings.

In case you are interested in one of the articles about this Chinese village, here is a good article from the art site Artsy:

Online Article: The World’s Art Factory Is in Jeopardy

If you would read this article, Dafen is called a painting factory village because that’s what it is. It is so built up like a factory that there are reproduction paintings that are painted by not only one man, but several.

For example, there would be a painter who would be an expert in painting a flower based on the style of a famous painter. Another painter may be an expert in painting an animal based on the style of the same famous painter.

Both painters do their part in painting as well as some of the other painters who are their co-workers. The result is a group effort in painting a single painting. Their work is similar to assembling a car in a factory. They are both assembly lines.

By why did I talk about Dafen? Or the ‘The World’s Art Factory?’ Because this is the answer as to whether or not there is a good market for painting reproductions. If an entire village is dedicated to one product, there must be good demand for it.

Remember that Dafen is reported to be the source for 60% of the world’s reproduction paintings, therefore the other 40% is scattered to some other countries in the world who also derive their income from these products and services.

As of 2018, Dafen has a population of 8,000. As most online resource would inform you, this is mainly composed of painters, frame makers, agents and their families. You might think that this doesn’t make sense.

Your question might be: Do you consider a worker number of less than 8,000 to be a significant indicator of good demand for a product? In the world of paintings, yes, not many people buy painting reproductions, maybe once in their lifetime at most.

But as Dafen has shown, there are enough painting reproduction buyers to keep almost 8,000 people employed full-time for almost their entire lives. But here’s the thing, the 60% number is just the official figure from the industry.

There are people who use the services of painters who are not aligned with the formal painting industry. The number of freelancer painters for example are not exactly accounted in the formal painting industry numbers.

And you could be one of these painters should you decide to make it your business to paint reproductions of famous paintings. You may not be formally educated in the art of paintings, but if you can paint well, you can do the job.

Let’s not kid ourselves, the painting businesses in Dafen are so well established to compete with in terms of price. They have an entire assembly line of painters who are willing to paint in exchange for a salary.

Then why go into the painting reproduction business if you wouldn’t be able to compete with assembly line type painting companies who can offer affordable rates to buyers? What’s the point then?

The point is that painting is an art. Just like in the art of singing, the singer who has a voice and a singing style almost exactly the same as the original singer would be highly desired by the listeners.

This means that the closer is your reproduction of a painting from its original, the more is the worth of your reproduction painting. I’m not really an art aficionado or expert. I can’t tell the intricacies of what makes a painting unique.

But if you are an expert in reproducing paintings that can fool anyone into thinking that what they are seeing is the original painting, then the more you would be highly sought of as a painter including your reproduction paintings.

Simply put, there are buyers who really know that painting technique and style of a particular famous painter. The only thing is that they’re not painters themselves and can’t paint even if their lives depended on it.

But they are such experts that they can tell for example how much paint a painter applies to a certain color of his painting. They for example can also be experts at knowing the brushstroke techniques of a particular painter.

Therefore, your buyers not only want a copy of a famous painting. They also want to be able to tell their friends that the reproduction painting they own is painted with the same painting style and technique of the original famous painter who may be already dead.

And this skill is what would differentiate you from the army of reproduction painters all over the world. Copying a painting is easy enough for the average painter, but to be able to duplicate a particular painter’s style and technique takes time and skill.

You might be thinking now: ‘Who is going to buy my reproduction paintings?’ The most important thing to realize is that paintings are made to be displayed. They are primarily intended to become a centerpiece attraction on a house or a building.

So don’t go for customers who buy reproduction paintings in bulk. They are the kind of customers who choose savings over quality. A company in the painting reproduction business gave out this nugget of information to would be painting reproducers.

She advises that there is for example a big difference between American and European buyers. American buyers almost all buy from China because the reproduction paintings being sold there are very cheap.

European buyers for their part have learned their lesson and are now shying away from buying from China. Many of these buyers have learned a great lesson when they bought cheap reproduction paintings from China which were below the standards that they would accept.

So what’s the lesson here? Target European buyers more than American buyers. If you are European, this is especially good news for you. But if you’re not, it’s better that you concentrate on your own domestic market first.

Painting Enthusiasts:

This is your greatest market. They are the most likely ones who would buy high quality reproduction paintings and are willing to spend good money for them. That is why it is important to find or create a list of these potential clients.

But how would we find these people? One of the ways is to coordinate with Museums and art galleries. They may be able to market your reproduction services. They may also vouch for the quality of your products.

You may come to a commission scheme agreement where the museum or art gallery takes a percentage of the income from your sales when they refer a client to you. I however, have not seen in my limited visits to some museums and art galleries of such a scheme.

Cultured People:

A person may not be into paintings but may still be cultured enough to appreciate that a beautiful painting would be a great addition to their homes. When I mean cultured, I don’t necessarily mean moneyed.

There are simply people who may be rich, average, or poor but may still be cultured. Normally, these people even though they are poor, have still enough disposable income to engage in some culture in their life.

For example, there is a great surge in art among the Chinese. This is due to their increasing standards of living. That’s why in whenever country you are, it is best to find out people who are moving up in life or are raising their living standards.

A person for example who had just recently bought a bigger or could have just bought their first house could be open minded enough to buy decorations for their house which includes reproduction paintings.

Besides these two people, there are the more commercial customers which consists of hotels, restaurants, clubs and other establishments who want to make an impression to their customers that they are a quality and refined establishment.

A restaurant for example that caters to a largely finance and investment group of clientele may wish to project an image that their restaurant is only for discerning clientele who knows a lot about art investments by displaying reproduction paintings of famous and expensive paintings.

Before you start reproducing famous paintings, you must first find out if the copyright on the painting has expired. You would be breaking the law if you reproduce a painting that is still copyrighted.

Unless you get permission from the original painter of the painting, it is illegal to duplicate and reproduce a copyrighted work for monetary gain. In the US for example, all painting produced today have this copyright protection:

“For the entire life of the painter plus 70 years,” so check first if a painter is still alive, if they’re dead, count 70 years. Then and only then would you be able to reproduce their painting. This is at least as far as US Laws go. Check your country’s laws.

Don’t think that all that you would paint all your life would be reproduction paintings. There have been painters who have managed to make the transition to market their own paintings. For example if Dafen, there are now painters who sell their own paintings and making a living out of it.

In effect, your reproduction paintings are just a display of your skill as a painter. You may even be able to establish a niche by creating entirely new paintings patterned after the style and look of a famous painter.

You might for example be known as a painter who paints in the style of Leonardo da Vinci or some other famous dead painter. The famous and also dead painter Degas for example copied the style and techniques of another painter whose name is Ingres.

So in effect, every painter has copied at one point or another from another painter. This may be as a part of a training at school or they may be doing it for the money.

As the village of Dafen in China has shown, there is a steady demand for reproduction paintings. Although they have cornered a large part of the global market, you can still compete in the upper brackets of the market where the buyers are more discerning.

One market would be European buyers who are not so keen to buy from China. But in whatever country you are, there would be always customers who would desire very expensive and famous paintings at much lowered prices.