There have been a lot of developments to the Innova Art range of products over the last few months and Stand A6/C5 in Hall 3.1 at Photokina 2016 will be the place to be to see them all. See our newest image display products including brand new panoramic size 8×20″ JetMaster Photo Panels and Hexagonal GOframe canvas stretching systems. Demonstrations will be taking place daily on the stand so you can see just how easy it is to make these professional image displays yourself.

In addition to the new developments in the JetMaster and GOframe ranges we will also be showing Pinchbook Photobooks: album and photo book covers that make binding so simple it only takes seconds. These products are the ideal addition to your print shop display range making great upsell options when combined with the Innova range of inkjet papers.

Our media range has also developed over the last few months. To reflect to the increasing move towards canvas printing we have now grouped all of our canvas products for aqueous and eco-solvent printing under the Innova Canvas range. This makes choosing the right Innova Canvas for your job even easier – no more cross referencing between multiple ranges. We have changed the names of some of them but all of your old favourites are here from high white matte to natural white ultra-gloss surfaces. There is also a brand new 100% cotton canvas – Exhibition Matte Cotton Canvas 370gsm (IFA 54), natural white and OBA free, the matte surface is perfect for displaying fine art prints.

Our Innova photo paper offering has also been extended with the addition of four resin coated inkjet photo papers. These four new RC medias are all compatible with both pigment and dye inkjet printers and sit alongside our award winning FibaPrint® papers in the newly renamed Photo Art range. The new grouping of these papers means that photographers worldwide can now get every surface type for fine art and photographic inkjet printing under the Innova brand name.

The final piece of exciting news we would like to share with you is the launch of a brand new range of specialist inkjet fine art and photo papers from Innova Art. The Innova Editions range features papers sharing qualities prized amongst fine art and photographic digital printmakers: all of the papers are OBA free and includes 100% Cotton matte and gloss surfaces, as well as our photo baryta paper with true barium sulphate layer.

Exclusively to Innova, the Innova Editions range also features two new Fabriano mould made papers: Fabriano Printmaking Rag 310gsm and Fabriano Artistico Watercolour Rag 310gsm. The Fabriano mill in Italy dates back to the 13^th Century and is known as the birthplace of European papermaking. The launch of Fabriano inkjet compatible art papers marks the first time that artists will be able to produce digital editions of their work on the same papers prized by artists such as Michelangelo and Da Vinci. A combination of traditional paper making techniques and innovative digital inkjet chemistry that makes Innova famous in the 21^st Century; the Innova Editions range represents a true meeting of tradition and innovation.

A great paper can make all the difference to a work of art and no one understands that better than The Archives. Milton H. Greene photographed some of the biggest names in the 20^th Century entertainment industry and The Archives LLC was founded to restore and preserve the archive of his work. The relationship between Innova fine art media and The Archives goes back over a decade and is based on matching peerless images to superlative media – which is why Innova is the paper of choice for print editions from The Archives. This year at Photokina we will be showing a selection of photographs by Milton H. Greene including Sammy Davis Jr., Liza Minnelli and Marilyn Monroe.

All of this and more will be on show on stand A6/C5 in Hall 3.1 at Photokina 2016, 20-25 September, Cologne, Germany.

For me there is something transient about the meaning of art, not just the work hanging on gallery walls or the editions being sold by artists worldwide but in the more every day designs we encounter. It used to be that only oil paintings or sculptures were considered to be art, now it can be anything. Previously the only ephemeral art form was flyers or posters pasted on a wall, perhaps this is still true but digital art also has ephemeral qualities, yet at the same time it has permanence. If you missed a light show or projection on the side of a building, that’s it, it’s gone, but YouTube can help you capture the essence of the experience. People collect posters, flyers and postcards because they like the way they look. You can spend hours working on a digital painting only to have the file corrupt on you when you try and open it again – not only a lesson in remembering to back up multiple file versions but also an example of how temporary the digital landscape can be. Recreating that painting is possible but starting from scratch means that not every pixel will be in the same place as before. Art is everywhere, in posters, wallpaper patterns and even down to the design of an individual letterform on a page. It is about leaving a lasting impression on the world we live in, whether we know the name of the creator or not, a part of them will live on for as long as the piece is preserved.

Art is also an escape, creating it can mean time away from a computer screen or thinking about the challenges that life can sometimes throw at you. Viewing it can give you an insight into the way that someone else thinks and an opportunity to see the world through another’s eyes. Art can make you laugh or cry, it can pull you up or push you down and, depending on your personal feelings; art can make something beautiful or ugly, that definitely makes the world a more interesting place. So perhaps art is also about making life more interesting? They say that a picture paints a thousand words but who is to say that every viewer sees the same words? Really a piece of art can illustrate hundreds, thousands or millions of words – depending on how large the audience is, and I wonder how many of those viewers experience what the artist intended them to experience, receive the message the piece was produced to broadcast (if there was an intended message at all) or respond in a way the artist expected.

Is art just visual? Personally I include music, theatre and literature as art, but perhaps for other people they fall into different categories. I would be really interested to hear your thoughts on what art is – you can post a comment below, or you can share your thoughts using #WhatIsArt on Twitter or by posing a comment on our Facebook page.

Kirsty-Anne Ward is part of the team responsible for marketing and design at Innova Art.

You can start from the basics of presentation, are you a photographer who sends printed proofs before clients make their final choices? How do you send those proofs, are they simply placed into an envelope? How about placing them into a reusable Pinchbook Photo Book instead? Send the book to your customers and ask them to remove the photos they do not like then send it back. When they return the book to you it will only contain the shots they love. If someone buys a single print, do you have the facility to offer an upsell on that item? JetMaster Image Display Systems provide simple display options, using minimal tools and can be created in just a few minutes, reducing the need for outsourcing on framing jobs.

Something else that can potentially add value to an individual print is embellishment. Whilst it involves more time as each print needs to be hand finished, it could be the icing on the cake to convince your customers to buy. Embellishment options range from using clear textured mediums over inkjet reproductions of original paintings, returning the texture of brush strokes to the print, to editing the print from the original by adding sections of gold leaf or flourescent colours to certain areas. These processes can be applied using a range of techniques from the humble paint brush to a spectrum of traditional print techniques including screen printing and lino cuts over canvas or paper prints. These is some debate amongst artists about how these prints should be sold – should they be marketed as originals or sold as as hand embellished giclée editions? The general consensus seems to be that it depends on what the original piece was. If it was created on a computer, then a print with embellishment could be produced as the original with a subsequent print edition being sold without any embellishment. If the print file originates from a photograph, or a photograph of a piece of artwork, then the prints would usually be listed as hand embellished giclée editions. The truth is that this is entirely down to the artist who is selling the prints. As the person who produces them it is something to be aware of but should not impact on any decision to expand the processes you offer.

What are your thoughts on adding value to prints, is this a service you currently offer, or, is it just a myth? Have you considered partnering with a company who offers different services to your own so you can both benifit from inreased revenue opportunities?