Care and Preservation of Works of Art on Paper and Fine Art Prints

Artwork must be handled with care to retain investment value. By following a few simple care guidelines your artwork will not only remain valuable but will also offer you many years of thorough enjoyment.

You may not like to hear this, but the best preservation for your art print(or original work of art on paper) is not to frame them, but keep them in cabinets, folders, or collector boxes instead.

Special metal cabinets for storing prints and maps are ugly, but best. A normal cabinet does not have the necessary depth to store large size prints. Metal cabinets are better than wooden ones because metal has no chemical emissions.

The prints should never be stored in a way that two prints are in direct contact with each other. Put each art print into a separate folder of acid-free paper and store them in horizontal position.

Hiding your prints in folders, boxes, and cabinets is like having a delicious piece of cake and not eating it, so naturally you want to frame a few of your treasures. The following are some guidelines for the proper handling and framing of your art prints.

The paper of the print itself needs to be handled carefully to prevent absorption of oils and/ or marks from fingertips. While handling, support the long sides of the paper with both hands, and if possible, protect the area to be touched with folded paper or use cotton gloves. Don't clean a print with water, oils, cleansers, polishes, sponges, or vacuums. Dust approximately every 6 months with the use of a light sable brush.

Putting artwork behind glass or plexiglass will protect it from accidental gouging. Plexiglass is lighter, doesn't shatter, and does not cause damaging condensation. You can purchase ultraviolet-shielding glass or plexiglass which will add to the life of the print. The artwork should never directly touch the glass or plexiglass, always use a spacer. All prints should be matted when framed. Only ragboard and other high-quality acid-free materials are to come in contact with works of art on paper. Make sure to hang them securely with strong hardware.

Do not keep your framed print in a brightly lit spot. Keep it away from direct sunlight, even strongly reflected sunlight. Incandescent light is much less harmful than either sunlight or florescent. Conservators recommend a light level of 5 to 8 foot- candles for limited periods of time, less than that if lighting is constant. You can get an approximate foot-candle measure using a camera's light meter. Set the camera to aperture-priority exposure, the aperture to 5.6 and the film speed to ASA 100. Point the camera at a sheet of white paper held in the same location as the artwork(while avoiding casting a shadow). The shutter speed will equal the foot-candles. Limiting light exposure will protect paper and pigments from chemical and physical deterioration.

Museums keep a constant temperature in their exhibition rooms. Extreme temperature fluctuations cause expansion and contractions of paper and makes it uneven. Extremes in temperature also cause frames to expand and contract. The Metropolitan Museum of Art suggests maintaining a temperature of 68-72F (20-21C).