Affordability and Art: Think the Print Club of Cleveland’s Fine Print Fair

You may have heard, affordability is a big deal these days. And yes, the cost of life’s essentials—food, energy, and health care—are high.

Yet, in these expensive times one essential thing is still affordable, original art. Think fine art prints, such as limited-edition etchings or woodcuts, printed either directly by the artists or under their supervision.

One of the best places to find affordable prints is the Fine Print Fair sponsored by the Print Club of Cleveland, the weekend of Friday, April 17, through Sunday, April 19, in the Cleveland Museum of Art’s atrium. Admission is free; a ticketed evening preview party on Thursday, April 16, will kick off the event.

The Fair features fifteen print dealers from across the country selling everything from new contemporary editions to eighteenth-century masters.

For $250, you can purchase the vivid nineteenth-century pochoir and lithograph Columbine, from Georgina Kelman Works on Paper.

Kelman, a New York-based print dealer, says she is always delighted when someone discovers they can afford a print. “You get a student or a young family who had no idea they can own art, that it’s not only for the wealthy,” she said. “It gives me great joy.”

For $170, you can own the etching Two Waiting Ballerinas from Chicago-based Armstrong Fine Art. “There is so much amazingly beautiful art begging to find a home,” said Bernard Derroitte, Armstrong’s owner. “If you have a job, you can make ends meet, and you want to live with art, buying an original print is a no-brainer.”

For $250, you can take home artist Jessica Campbell’s varied edition screenprint Anadolia, for sale by Process/Process, a new Chicago-based print publisher. The print plays with a Picasso-like face of a woman, slightly altered in each separate print. “We sell to a lot of artists, because prints are all artists can afford,” said Angee Lennard, printer at Process/Process.

If you can spend a little more, you have even greater selection. “Once you get to $300 or $350, options abound,” Derroitte said.

More print dealers than we can mention feature lower-priced prints. But even if you cannot afford to buy anything, the Fair is a great place to browse thousands of pieces of art, from Joan Miro at Philadelphia’s Dolan/Maxwell, to Faith Ringold at Raven Fine Arts, or even Henri Matisse at Pia Gallo.

So, browse and learn. Print dealers are educators as well as marketers, and they love to explain their art to Fair attendees.

For more information, go to printclubcleveland.org. See you at the Fair—it’s free!

THE PRINT CLUB OF CLEVELAND
11150 East Boulevard
Cleveland, Ohio 44106
printclubcleveland.org
216.707.2579

EVENTS:
Fine Print Fair, April 17–19, free and open to the public. Ticketed preview party Thursday, April 16