At the PMA 2010 Show in Anaheim this week, the DIMA Innovative Digital Product Award was presented to HP ARTtrust for a joint development between HP and Prooftag that helps photographers and artists maintain the authenticity of their work.
What makes the ARTtrust system so innovative is the ARTtrust Bubble Tag™, in which a random set of air bubbles is encapsulated in a translucent polymer film. There is no technical way to reproduce each Bubble Tag’s tridimensional code, and the tag cannot be removed without altering the visual appearance of the film layer. When an art print is produced for sale, the photographer or artist applies a silver Bubble Tag to the back of the print, a gold Bubble Tag to the customer’s certificate of authenticity, and a blue Bubble Tag to their own copy of the certification document. The photographer or artist then registers the tag number on the print to his or her personal space on ARTtrust Online.
Sellers or buyers who want to verify the authenticity of a particular print can visit ARTtrust Online and input the print’s Bubble Tag number. The online records then show an image of the print, an enlarged view of the print’s unique Bubble Tag configuration, and information about the artist, printing method, and type of materials used.
In my opinion, the importance of ARTtrust will be most immediately apparent to every photographer and artist who has witnessed some of the obstacles digital prints have overcome over the past 15 years to gain acceptance among buyers of investment-worthy art. Now that some photographers have sold pigment prints for as much as $30,000 apiece, ARTtrust is a logical next step in assuring collectors that the print they are buying is authentic.
The Lessons of History: Shortly after I started reporting on digital printing in 1994, I interviewed several pioneering printmakers including Jon Cone and Graham Nash. At the time, they were exploring how the $126,000 printer that Iris Graphics designed for prepress proofing could be used to generate art prints, output scanned photos, or provide a less chemically toxic printmaking alternative to screen printing limited editions (serigraphy).
While the Iris 3047 was the first printer that could output images onto large sheets of art papers, the dye inks formulated for proofing weren’t nearly stable enough for long-term display. Prints displayed behind glass would start to fade in less than 5 years. After Henry Wilhelm started providing image-permanence test data to members of the now defunct International Association of Fine Art Digital Printmakers, he launched a free-access website (www.wilhelm-research.com) for the purpose of publishing updated print-permanence information. At the same time, he began encouraging printer manufacturers to develop pigment inks that would make inkjet-printed photographic and art prints more stable.
Photographer Douglas Kirkland, who has photographed dozens of the most glamorous stars in Hollywood, was one of the artists and photographers who recognized the creative potential of inkjet printers right from the start. When I spoke with Douglas at the PMA Show, he told me that “If Henry Wilhelm hadn’t started his organization, it would have had to be invented. His work has been that critical.”
Kirkland didn’t feel comfortable enough to use inkjet printers for the prints he sold to collectors until about five years ago, when HP and other printer manufacturers started using pigment inks and displaying print-permanence ratings from Wilhelm Imaging Research (WIR). He is particularly impressed that many combinations of HP Vivera pigment inks and fine art media have WIR Print Permanence Ratings of more than 250 years.
Now, Kirkland and his assistants Miranda Bracket and Jeremy Oversier routinely make prints on the HP Designjet Z series printer they have in the studio. Kirkland, who has extensive darkroom experience with both black-and-white and color prints, considers in-studio digital printing a photographer’s dream come true: “We make a print, we check it, and often go back to the computer. It’s interactive, exhilarating and creative. What we once did in the darkroom, we can now do infinitely better and more efficiently.”
Nevertheless, Kirkland has also recognized that the same software and printing technologies that has given him the ultimate creative control over the final look of his prints can also be used against him. Digital printing processes have become so refined that perfect copies of a print can be made without his knowledge.
“This risk isn’t exclusive to pigment prints,” notes Philippe Serenon, co-founder of the new ARTtrust subsidiary of Prooftag. “Many high-value products all over the world are counterfeited and sold to unsuspecting buyers.” In fact, the ARTtrust technology has been adapted from Prooftag technology that has been used for years to help producers of high-value wines, watches, documents and art objects protect their products from counterfeiting.
Kirkland believes that over the next 10 years ARTtrust will prove to be just as valuable to sellers and buyers of pigment prints as Henry Wilhelm’s print-permanence testing has been to creating the technology used to create the pigment prints.
“Professional collectors must be able to verify that the photograph or work of art they are buying is genuine,” says Kirkland, “And we have to protect what we create. When art buyers see the Bubble Tag on the back of the print, they will know that the print is not a knock-off done in some back room.”
And because not all digital works are created equal, buyers can use ARTtrust Online to find out what print process and materials were used for each registered print. With ARTtrust, if the print was produced on an HP Designjet Z series printer with Vivera inks and media tested by Wilhelm, the art buyer will be able to see the Wilhelm Print Permanence Rating for that print.
“It takes just a few minutes to enter your data on the computer,” says Kirkland. “But any photographer who places a high value on their work will want that value to be realized.”
Before meeting with editors at a reception at the PMA Show, Douglas Kirkland attached a Bubble Tag™ to one of his legendary prints of Marilyn Monroe. He then applied a second tag to the certificate of authenticity that will accompany the print. He keeps the third copy of Bubble Tag with his own files for the print. (Photo: Katherine Wetzel)
At PMA, I also talked to Henry Wilhelm, who is an enthusiastic proponent of the ARTtrust system. As an expert in the long-term preservation of photo and film archives, he likes the fact that ARTtrust doesn’t require any special equipment to visually read the code. This means that the Bubble Tags will still be readable years after a photographer has stored prints that he or she wants to preserve as part of their legacy as an artist. 
Harald Johnson is another digital-printing historian who understands the significance of ARTtrust. While I wrote magazine articles about digital printing from 1994 to 2008, Harald founded the digital-fine arts forum in Yahoo!, wrote the groundbreaking book series Mastering Digital Printing, and established an online resource site for digital printmakers, artists, and photographers (www.dpandi.com). In recent years, he has been working with Magnum photographers and HP Experts & Mentors all over the world. He understands just how eager these accomplished professionals are for a system that will help them preserve the value of their image archives.
In the HP booth at PMA 2010, Johnson wasn’t surprised by how many printmakers, artists, photographers, and journalists expressed interest in learning more about ARTtrust Online. “I could see it in their eyes,” said Johnson. “As soon as they saw the whole solution in front of them, there was an ‘aha’ moment. They got it and they wanted it.”
Photographer David Saffir, also on the HP Experts & Mentors team, posted a report about ARTtrust on his own blog. He also attended PMA and had an opportunity to speak with press, artists, photographers, printmakers, curators, and others. "They were drawn to ARTtrust as a tool that empowers artists and those who work with them. They see itt is a management and tracking solution that is accurate, easy to use, and effective in preventing fraud and unauthorized use."
Click here to learn more about ARTtrust or visit ARTtrust Online.
For more information about how inkjet printing and print permanence testing evolved, download Henry Wilhelm’s paper entitled, A 15-Year History of Digital Printing Technology and Print Permanence in the Evolution of Digital Fi....
In the HP booth at the PMA Show, Harald Johnson (left) poses with the team from Douglas Kirkland Photography (left to right): Francoise Kirkland, Douglas Kirkland, Miranda Brackett, and Jeremy Oversier. (Photo by David Saffir)
