How to read an edition: 3/25, AP, HC and the rest

In the corner of a print, in pencil, a fraction: 3/25. Beside another, two letters: AP. On a third, HC. These are not codes for insiders. They are the edition speaking, and it takes five minutes to understand it.

The fraction

3/25 means the third print of an edition of twenty-five. The number on the right is the one that matters: it is how many exist, and it does not change. The number on the left is the order in which this one was numbered, usually not the order in which it was printed, and it says nothing about quality. A low number is not a better print; a complete edition is a promise kept.

The letters

AP, or EA (épreuve d'artiste): an artist's proof, one of a few prints outside the numbered edition that the artist keeps or sells. They are the same image, from the same plate or file, and they count: a serious certificate says how many there are.

HC (hors commerce): prints made for the record and not meant for sale at the time, often given to the printer or the publisher. They sometimes reach the market later; the certificate should say so.

BAT (bon à tirer): the one print the artist approved before the edition was made, the standard the others were held to.

What is an original, then?

Every print in an edition is an original work: the artist made the plate, the file or the matrix, approved each print and signed it. What makes it an edition is that it exists several times, and what protects you is knowing exactly how many. A lenticular print, a photograph, a screenprint, a lithograph: the logic is the same. The editions on this site state their size on the work's page.

What the certificate should say

The number of this print and the size of the edition, the number of artist's proofs, the technique and the paper, and the artist's signature. The certificates issued here carry those facts and cannot be edited afterwards, which is the point: an edition is a count, and a count must not move.

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Image: “LS562321 (White Clematis)” by Andrea Wolf.