Posted May 12, 2003

Gordon's, the premier publisher of print and photograph price references, offers products superior to those of other art price publishers for a number of reasons. Gordon's entries contain technical data not found in other references like quality of images' impressions, paper types, condition information, and margin details (as described in auction catalogues). Gordon's also provides extensive reference book bibliographies, and, for prints, its editorial staff corrects incorrect titles, states, catalogue raisonne numbers, and other errors that appear in auction catalogue listings. Titles of prints are translated into the language of the catalogue raisonne for many major artists.

Gordon's gives international auction sales records for prints and photographs in all price ranges with no minimum price cut-offs, as well as prices for buy-ins (items that fail to sell) and withdrawn lots (items withdrawn from auctions before sales take place). This year, buy-ins and withdrawn lots no longer include buyer premiums, as they have in previous years; buy-ins and withdrawals are also more clearly labeled than on previous CDs.

Other art price companies may publish print and photograph price references that cost less, but as the old adage goes, you get what you pay for.

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Gordon's Print Price Annual 2003-1986, 2 CD-ROM set is the best computer print price database product of its kind available. It contains seventeen years of international print auction records totaling over 675,000 entries by over 27,000 artists. Sales records include those for Old Master, Modern, and Contemporary fine prints; decorative, historical, botanical, topographical, and Japanese prints; vintage, fine art, and film posters; illustrated books, livres d'artiste (artist books), books and periodicals with original graphics; Picasso ceramics; and more. Also included on the CD-ROM are older print prices dating from the turn-of-the-century to 1985; a trilingual print lexicon in English, French, and German; and a worldwide directory of auction houses, print dealers, and photography dealers. Over 7,000 print images are also included.

Gordon's CD-ROMs are easy to use and getting faster all the time. Please note that Macintosh users need PC emulating software in order to run Gordon's products.

Gordon's Print Price Annual International 2003-1986, 2 CD-ROM set edited by Lisa Reinhardt, Gordon's Art Reference, Inc., Phoenix, 2003, $595 for the initial subscription, $295 for subsequent annual updates.

For those of you who still prefer hard copy price records to CD-ROMs, Gordon's Print Price Annual 2003 in book form contains over 50,000 price results of prints by nearly 9,000 artists that sold at auctions worldwide during the year 2002.

Gordon's Print Price Annual International 2003 Edition edited by Lisa Reinhardt, Gordon's Art Reference, Inc., Phoenix, 2003, hardbound, 1630 pages, 8 1/2 by 11 inches, $245; six-month update, $95.

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Gordon's Photography Prices, 2003-1970, CD-ROM is the world's leading resource of price information for 19th and 20th century photographs as well as for books and periodicals containing original photographs. It contains over 150,000 sales results for photographs by over 13,000 photographers sold primarily at international auctions, but also includes some dealer prices. Sales results date from as far back as the 1930's, but most are current and date from the past eleven years; nearly 15,000 entries are brand new and date from the 2002 auction year. Each entry includes the name of the photographer, title of the image, type of print, data about the negative and date of the printing, signature, date, condition, additional annotations (when applicable), auctioneer, catalogue number, and selling price in Dollars, Pounds, Euros, and the currency of the country where the sale took place. Dimensions are given in inches and millimeters.

Added bonuses are that buy-ins and withdrawals are included, as noted in an auction house's sales results, and approximately 6,000 price records are accompanied by illustrations of the actual photographs. To repeat and elaborate a bit, a buy-in is an item that is placed up at auction, but fails to sell. A withdrawal is an item that is removed from a sale before it takes place; reasons for removal include ownership disputes, problems with authenticity, misrepresentation by consignors, and so on. Data for unsold and withdrawn items is important to have when researching art that's being offered to you for sale. For example, if you are offered a photograph for $7000 and find out in Gordon's Photography Price Annual International 2003-1970 CD-ROM that a year ago, it was withdrawn or failed to sell because bidding didn't reach the minimum reserve price of $3000, you'll know not to buy because you're being offered previously shopped merchandise at an excessively high price.

This year's CD-ROM runs faster on your computer than editions from previous years and also includes extras like a lexicon of terms, and worldwide directories of auction houses, print dealers, and photograph dealers.

For those of you who prefer traditional hard-copy photography price references, Gordon's Photography Price Annual International 2003 also happens to be the world's leading guide to fine art photography prices at auction. The current edition contains nearly 15,000 sales results for original photographs and photographically illustrated books that sold worldwide at auctions during the year 2002. Image titles are arranged alphabetically under each artist, rather than from highest to lowest selling prices, which makes locating selling prices for particular titles easy.

Gordon's Photography Prices, 2003-1970, CD-ROM edited by Lisa Reinhardt, Gordon's Art Reference, Inc., Phoenix, 2003. Initial subscription: $595. Subsequent annual updates: $195.

Gordon's Photography Price Annual International 2003 Edition edited by Lisa Reinhardt, Gordon's Art Reference, Inc., Phoenix, 2003, hardbound, 661 pages, 8 7/8 by 11 1/4, $145.