The answer to this question is not cut and dried. Looking back through history, it was common for artists to copy not only the work of others, but their own work as well. Think about it. How else would someone obtain a copy of a painting he liked other than asking he artist himself to paint a duplicate. Many of the masters also allowed others to copy their work.

Why would someone want to outright copy a painting. One of the most legitimate and acceptable reasons would be for the purpose of education. After all, in music a music student plays the works of the masters over and over again. They study the compositions and then they create their own based on what they have learned. One must first copy the masters before one can truly branch out and develop his own style. It is through copying the work of others that technique is learned. Having said this, copying is not about inspiration. Although one can be inspired by another’s work, true inspiration is a more divine concept. Copying is more about technique.

However, there have been instances throughout history in which someone has attempted to forge a painting under a master’s name. This is obviously unacceptable, but the trend of creating works of art similar to that of another painter is only natural. Consider Cubism. Would it have made any sense if Picasso had burst onto the art scene and blown it away with his new style of art only to have no one try to create it on their own? Of course not. Imitation is natural for human beings and yes, it is a form of flattery. The subconscious in particular loves to be mirrored and so does the conscious self.

It comes down to this. Copying someone’s work and presenting it as yours or not acknowledging the true author of the work is forgery. Copying the work in order to learn the techniques or imitating the techniques and creating the same style of art for the purpose of education, self-exploration, and creation are imitation and flattery in their highest form. Of course, there are always those who do not copy, but who create new ways of doing things.

The true geniuses are the ones who are imitated.

Both of these artists were known to suffer from mental illness. Munch had what is now believed to be bi-polar disorder. Van Gogh suffered from paranoia, and possibly a myriad of other mental ailments, including epilepsy and absynth addiction, that the psychiatric community still debates. It is clear that they both suffered in ways which most of us are fortunate to not understand, but how did it show up in their work.

Vincent Van Gogh : The Starry Night - 1889

In looking at the paintings of both Munch and Van Gogh, it may be tempting to say that Munch was the more disturbed of the two. In fact, Van Gogh was an influence for Munch. He painted emotion, raw emotion. These emotions were dark and “negative” and his work had a depth of sorrow and madness to it that may be unsurpassed. On the other hand, while Van Gogh’s paintings were often somber, hey do not seem to embody the depths of sadness and despair that are seen in Munch’s work.

Edvard Munch : The Scream - 1898

Munch definitely has the privilege of having painted a painting that has come to symbolize our own modern feeling of despair and hopelessness. The Scream has become an icon of the world today and many people can relate to – that feeling of just wanting to scream!

His paintings were part of his therapy with his forward thinking doctors feeling that it would be beneficial for him to paint and express his feelings whilst in the asylum.

We will probably never know who had the more severe mental illness. Certainly Munch’s most likely stemmed from the fearful upbringing of his parents. His father instilled in him and his siblings the fear of eternal Hell and living in fear, especially as a child, creates deep-seated damage to the mind and soul. Van Gogh is for many the embodiment of the tortured artist. He cut off the earlobe of his left ear, an act of self-mutilation, after an argument with fellow artist Paul Gauguin. A year later he shot himself.

Vincent Van Gogh : Self Portrait with a Bandage - 1889

It is difficult to compare mental illness, each person and their experiences are so radically different. However, it is obvious that mental illness and insanity are not enough to stop geniuses from creating masterpieces that will be with us for eternity. In a way, both Munch’s and Van Gogh’s sadness and the torture they endured will be with us for eternity as well.

Compared to the few million dollars it costs for a genuine Picasso or van Gogh, then you might be apt to call reproduction paintings the “poor man’s art”. It all depends on your definition of poor. The truth of the matter is reproduction art is a very affordable and reputable way to build an extensive and sometimes valuable art collection.

So how can reproduction art be so wonderful and even valuable? First, it is important not to confuse reproductions with prints, which are merely copies of the original. Prints come in the form of posters so they are not actual paintings. Reproductions are created by a highly talented artist. The artist who paints reproductions must know every technique used by the masters who created the original.

In fact, it is not even as simple as the technique merely being copied. The reproduction artist works hard to use the same quality canvas and oils as the original artist and also becomes familiar enough with the painting to duplicate lighting, brushes, and brush strokes. It is clear that reproductions are not mere knock-offs of a great work of art. They take a lot of talent, time, and effort to get it just right.

Reproduction artists are expert painters. They simply are not creating their own unique paintings, or at least not exclusively. Perhaps in reproducing the work of the masters they are practicing and enhancing their technical ability or perhaps they just enjoy recreating the masterpieces and consider it a challenge and an honor to do so. A good way to look at it is that reproduction artists are doing us a very valuable favor. They are making it possible to bring the work of the masters into our homes. Otherwise we would have to wait until we went to a famous museum or made some very rich friends before we could ever experience the pleasure of inspiration and awe that the masters inspire in us all.

As a company which produces reproduction paintings, we are of course slightly biased, but certainly as we have experience of producing paintings of a high standard then we are fully aware of the talent it takes to reproduce a master.

Interestingly it is sometimes very much more difficult to reproduce a painting which would be considered “simpler” such as a Kandinsky, rather than something more realistic like a Bouguereau. The reason being that the details in a painting which is more abstract are much more important to the piece, as there are fewer of them. As an example, if you were painting three shapes on a canvas and one was out of place, or enlarged or in some other way distorted; it would be quite plain to see. If a leaf on a tree amongst thousands was a little bit too much to the right however, it would be nearly impossible to notice.

Abstract paintings also often requrie the feeling of the artist to be projected onto the canvas, whereas realistic painting use their subjects to invoke emotion and passion in the viewer. Reproduction of both styles are of course incredibly difficult things to acheive, and the reason why we are so very picky with the artists we choose to work with us.

Much in the same way as an Olympic figure skater, we do not simply want to envoke feelings of “nice”, or “I could do that”; our objective is to make people look at the art and wonder how on Earth it is possible to produce something so naturally beautiful, whilst at the same time not giving the slightest hint of the hundreds of hours practice it took to reach such a high level of excellence.