Our 10th birthday Artist Trading Print Project has been extended until we say it is over. Click here to read more about the project - otherwise see below for more details about the extension.

Project extension

For those eagle-eyed people who noticed that we’d previously specified July 6th as the end of the project, you may be wondering why we’ve not made a fanfair of it. We’ve decided to extend the project without putting a specific date on the closure - though it’s likely to be the end of the summer.

This is because of a number of factors, the main one being two significant paper supply issues.

Paper supply issues

The first paper issue was at the beginning of the project when the metallic paper we wanted to use for our shiny versions arrived looking completely different from the sample. Rather than a sheeny blue metallic finish, the paper had a dull silver that looked cheap. We swapped it for a more expensive but much more beautiful 340gsm Hahnemuhle Metallic Photo Rag that exceeded the quality of our original idea, but delayed the project from starting fully by about 10 days.

The second issue began three weeks ago when our most popular paper that we use for the base cards, and many of our clients normal printing, was out of stock with our suppliers. This is a first in our 10 year history. We were assured the order would arrive within a week, but it didn’t come. And it didn’t come. And it didn’t come. Three weeks later and we’ve been assured it will come this week. We have a limited stock we’re using for our customer orders, but until the new order comes we can only print the trading card prints in spare strips of otherwise wasted paper beside customer orders.

Obeying the algorithm

We’ve noticed our reach on social media posts decline the more we post. The algorithms don’t like repeated and daily posting, but we want to give air space to every artist involved in the project. Rather than putting in a lot of work writing bios for each artist only for a handful of people to ever see them, we’ve decided to take the foot off the gas pedal and post a little less over a longer timeframe in an attempt that our posts are given more exposure.

When is the next Exquisite 10 being released?

We released Aaron Bevan Bailey’s (#04) last week, but were so busy we didn’t have time to blow the trumpet very hard. Click here to read the clue to unlock the shiny version.

We’ll announce the next release later this week or early next.

When will winners be announced?

We still have three cards to release, so we’ll release those on a roughly weekly schedule, and then allow a few weeks for people to collect them. We predict that a winner can be announced at the end of the summer/ early autumn but we’ll run it as long as it needs to run. The winner is whoever collects the most cards (excluding Simon’s mum, who would almost certainly be winning it if she wasn’t related to us and therefore exempt from claiming the prize!)

See the entire collection this saturday 12th July at the Silk Mill Open Studios

I’ve temporarily displayed the entire collection including the three unreleased cards as part of our Silk Mill open studios exhibition Tinctoria, come along to the Silk Mill 11am-4pm on Saturday to see the entire set alongside a collaborative exhibition of works by Silk Mill artists and associate artists, including a video and sonic installation by David Daniels and Oliver William Olivers.