A price-tier structure increasing 4-times in a small edition of 15 does not seem at all awkward, whereas a 10-times (or more) increase in cost in an edition of 950 seems utterly ridiculous.
Regardless of what path an artist takes in creating limited editions, there are certain traits to each path that don’t crossover. This approximately 4-time increase in the purchase price helps increase the value of the piece as it sells, setting up his work to gain value in the secondary market. The work is presented on a price tier structure, increasing as the edition sells - which makes a lot of sense when you consider only 18 people will ultimately own a large print! His pricing structure begins in the $4k range and tops out in the $16k range for the final of the large framed prints. He, on the other hand, has small limited editions of only 50 and 3 Artist Proofs - 35 smaller 13x13” prints, 15 large 36x36” prints, and only 3 dynamic 48x48” Artist Proofs. I also have had a number of discussions with David Fokos, who I admire greatly, regarding the topic of editions. He went further into the explanation, and in relation to his work and his collectors, it made perfect sense to me. A print that only sells five times, is really an edition of 5 - not of whatever preset limit the artist made up beforehand. To make a finite number means that if a print sells out, you can no longer make it available to a new collector. You number the prints and record the date as you go so the collector knows when and where they are with the print, and the cost of the print does indeed increase as it sells, naturally slowing the sale of the print. You may sell 5 prints total, or it may be very popular and you sell 500.
Burkett’s theory was, and I am paraphrasing here - when you release an image, you don’t know how many are going to sell and how the public will respond to it. A number of years ago, I found myself in a 2 hour conversation with Christopher Burkett and his wife, where much of the conversation revolved around this topic. I have been lucky enough to discuss this topic at length with a number of Master photographers, all of whom are taking different approaches. Both edition methods are fine and have their place, but both have certain characteristics that they naturally carry with them. Cindy Sherman, second to only Gursky on the list of most expensive photographs sold, has offered editions of 10 or less. The highest paid photograph by Andreas Gursky, Rhein II which fetched 4.3 million in auction, is an edition of 6 with 2 artist proofs.
On the flip side, you have artists who offer very small limited editions, which is common in the contemporary photography world. Much of my own work is comprised of relatively large editions of 250 or 450. Christopher Burkett, who in my opinion is the Ansel-of-today, doesn’t limit his prints to a preset edition. Ansel and his contemporaries didn’t limit their prints to a preset edition. I certainly don’t have any issue with artists offering large editions of 950 or more prints, or even offering Open Editions with no preset limit. It seems, one can hope, that these potential photography buyers are becoming more savvy to some of the selling tactics employed by the Lik Galleries, and beginning to question the absurd pricing structure for the not-very limited editions of 950. God, I hope so! A number of times lately I have fielded phone calls and emails from prospective buyers who were previously looking at Lik’s work, but were turned off for one reason or another and began looking elsewhere.
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