I have a small giclee of Bambi by Jim Salvati that hangs in my office. Collectors Editions(the company that produces Disney Fine Art) took a snippet from the original and made giclees of it for us as a gift when we toured their facility in February.
And you probably don't have to worry about your co-workers discovering you have that much money worth of artwork on your walls. I know of someone who looked at the size of my Bambi print and proceeded to tell me how cheaply it had been done and how the piece wasn't very nice. Having toured the facility where the print was made, I know considerably more about how that process than this individual did. Unless they're well versed in fine art, they may think it's nothing more than a nice painting.
Random facts about fine art that may help clear up confusion:
The original painting is the largest and always one of a kind. Because the price is very, very expensive(usually in the thousands of dollars) and because demand for some artists is going to be very high, giclees will be made. Giclee comes from a French word meaning sprayed on ink. After the original is completed, it is scanned into the computer and then printed using a very high tech printer onto the medium(canvas or paper). The artist will then take a look at the first few prints to check for color accuracy and so forth. Once the artist signs off on the painting, these first few become known as artists proofs.
Once the artist has approved, the painting will then be printed up to the edition size. Almost all the time, the giclee is smaller than the original painting. On rare occasion, you will find a giclee that is very close to the size of the original, but not often. The painting that Kinkade is unveiling in the picture is the original, hence why it's so much larger than the ones that most everyone else has on their walls. So, even though you don't have the original painting, you still have the painting. You can know that the colors on your painting match the colors that the artist put on the original.
One final thought here. Sometimes Disney does "deluxe prints" of the artwork. Even though they're printed on paper, they are not giclees on paper and are much, much smaller than the giclee edtions of the piece. Anyone who has the very small Kinkade 50th piece has the deluxe print. I've usually only seen the deluxe prints on some(but not all) pieces featuring park attractions.
Lol, the guy auctioning off the original looks like the guy from the new Law and Orders.
...they have made me smile so many time...the make-up ones are sooo cool...jc
he did get me a cute picture of jasmine and aladdins first kiss from DTD..ill see if i can take a pic and post it up!
