UPDATE: The Fine Art Registry website is down, with no sign of returning. According to one source, a Fine Art Registry lawsuit resulted from a cyber-smear campaign. All of Fine Art Registry’s Youtube videos have been removed, along with their Twitter and blog. If you have been affected, please leave a comment below.
Fine Art Registry is a website that allows online registration of art from artists, museums, and galleries. The tagging system is permanent, and cannot be removed without leaving evidence of tampering.
The FAR® ID tags assist in countering art theft and fraud by having a registry number.
This number can help to trace the artwork back to the Fine Art Registry database, where the artist may be positively identified.
The documentation seals are tamper and counterfeit proof. They measure one inch in diameter and are completely acid free, with a strong adhesive. The identification tags have over 5 security levels. If tampered with or removed, a traceable residue is left behind.
The registered details of each label at the Fine Art Registry® website consist of an artwork name, artist, date created, size, estimated value, and current status. Artists may also attach an extra photo displaying the FAR tag on the artwork, along with a signature.
Fine Art Registry also presents useful information for all artists, including art events, recent art news, investigations, videos, and an artist forum.
Free Fine Art Registry members can add documentation for FAR ID tags that they purchase. But, the site also offers a selection of packages for premium members. What follows are some of the features of for those who choose to upgrade.
Features for Fine Art Registry Premium Members
- Create a certificate of authenticity for free anytime (for items that are registered). The certificate includes the Fine Art Registry ID number of the artwork.
- Transfer of Ownership
Ownership may be transferred to the art buyer for purchased artworks. The artwork will appear in the art collector’s portfolio at Fine Art Registry.
Report artworks are that are lost or stolen by updating its status, which is displayed along with the piece in your portfolio. This helps to increase the chance of successful recovery.
- Create a portfolio of registered artworks. Each image is displayed with the FAR tag number beneath it. This will give the art buyer confidence that the artwork is safe to buy.
There are options to include a bio and links to Twitter, Facebook, and an art website. Additionally, a Youtube video can be embedded in the portfolio page.
- Fine Art Promotion Program
Fine Art Registry regularly features member artists. These are published at the Fine Art Registry website, as well as being sent to art publications and magazines. All featured artists get to be published in the Fine Art Registry Guide to Contemporary Artists.
- Art Sales Gallery
Artists may sell up to 50 artworks at a time, with the option of being paid through Paypal. There is no commission for this service, just the regular membership fee.
How to Get Started With Fine Art Registry
First signup at Fine Art Registry as a free member, then order identification tags. Transfer the ID tag to your artwork, then upload an image, adding information about the piece.
(Artpromotivate is not (and never been) affiliated with Fine Art Registry)
It should be noted that registering at Fine Art Registry is not the same as copyright. For official copyright, artists should register their art with the government (www.copyright.gov).
What do you think of the Fine Art Registry? Will you be using the ID tags to provide online registration of art?
What do you think of the fact that a site like FAR can be gone tomorrow? I have been trying to access their FAR tags online and they have been down for maintenance for weeks.
ReplyDeleteAnything other than US copyright or another gov't branch is, at best, a gamble. Even if FAR comes back (much of their site is still accessible as a database), it still raises the question of trustworthiness and longevity.
All I was really attracted to as an artist were the nice looking holographic tags. Once I get a number, I can "register" it in my files, and it will stay in the files of my estate when I pass.
Comments? email offline if you want -- rlphoto@gci.net
Ron
Fine Art Registry is defunct, according to the internet servers. All of their Youtube videos are gone, and their blogs. This is a lesson to all artists everywhere who entrust their inventory with an outside source such as FAR. Terrible mistake. It reminds me of my musician friends who complain that the original master studio recordings of their songs are gone forever because they foolishly trusted the studios to "preserve" their music, only to find the company dissolved. Nothing is permanent. Nothing.
ReplyDeleteGood riddance. No one will miss Theresa Franks and Fine Art Registry.
ReplyDeleteWith FAR being gone,does this mean Park West has won or did someone
ReplyDeletefollow through with a death threat.Teri said she had gotten some death threats.
She said a lot of things. But who can believe her now? No one. In the end, she turned her back on the very artists she claimed to advocate for. Greed and avarice are all consuming. What a mess that Theresa Franks.
DeleteThe problem with this sort of technology is that it becomes obsolete over time. And for a company to claim your information is secure for hundreds of years is plain wrong. Take Picasso for instance, he had a biographer, Christian Zervos, whose catalog raisonne still stands as the most complete inventory of the artist's work. Yes, there are some floating around for sure. But, at least you have the great majority of them published. Any artist can do such a thing if he or she takes the time to snap a picture, note the date, size and medium. Then print out several hard copies of the catalog and back it up on hard drive if you want. At least when the electricity goes out, or in Fine Art Registry's case --die off and disappear, there's still a book one can open up and read next to a candlelight. This is a lesson that an art magazine or publication should explore further.
ReplyDeletefrom Cruisebruise.com:
ReplyDeleteTeri Franks Fine Art Registry Biz Is Dead
by Editor on 11/16/12
http://www.cruisebruise.com/index.html?entry=teri-franks-fine-art-registry
Yesterday I awoke to the surprising news that Theresa (Teri) S. Franks, owner of Fine Art Registry has gone out of business. You may remember, that Franks was all over the web, deep into social media on the topic of cruise ship art auctions, which Franks alleged were defrauding cruise ship passengers. There were lawsuits involving Franks and multiple parties, that went on for years.
Then suddenly, I'm notified by the lawyer working for Park West Galleries Inc and another firm which now owns the rights to Frank's website, he's been victorious in the lawsuit against Franks and her companies, "As a result of legal actions, the FAR [Fine Art Registry] website has been removed from the internet and the contents thereof . . . "
In trying to verify this information on the web, I found the Franks' website was very much dead and any mention of her or her company seems to have been scrubbed from the web for the most part. The domain names FAR previously owned, appeared to be snatched up by a company which buys dead domains,
My conclusion - it didn't end well for Franks. A court document filed October 26, 2012 shows the lawsuit ended as a "stipulated dismissal with prejudice", both parties to bear the costs of their legal fees. According to the letter Park West Galleries' attorney Paul J. Schwiep of Miami, Florida sent me, it's certainly clear the lawsuit didn't end well for Franks.
What is unclear at this point, is how this affected the many artists who used Global Fine Art Registry services, who no longer have access to any of Franks' websites, though they paid fees for the access and art registration services Franks provided.
Franks' 501(c)(3) not-for-profit organization, Fine Art Advocacy Foundation (#26-3267248) website, fineartadvocacyfoundation.org, is also down. The organization is classified as an active public charity as of this date.
However, this was not the end to Franks' legal issues. We will revisit this case as the saga continues.
I was a member of Fine Art Registry. My tags are now useless. And I feel like a fool for once believing in Fine Art Registry and Theresa Franks. I feel violated and deceived. Does anyone know if refunds are being given?
ReplyDeleteBased on what Cruisebruise reported above: "Then suddenly, I'm notified by the lawyer working for Park West Galleries Inc and another firm WHICH NOW OWNS THE RIGHTS to Frank's website,..."As a result of legal actions, the FAR [Fine Art Registry] website has been removed from the internet and the contents thereof . . . "
ReplyDeleteWell, I think contacting Park West Gallery is in order to find out more information. I had quite a bit registered on the website. And it contained information that I referred to when needed, not to mention the website being on ALL my printed promotional material. Park West Gallery also has our images. Does anyone else foresee a potential problem with that?
I think it speaks volumes if Park West Gallery now owns the rights to Fine Art Registry and didn't contact its customers before it just "removed" the site from existence.
No matter how Fine Art Registry & Park West Gallery apparently "settled" out of court, Park West Gallery ended up with the rights to Fine Art Registry and they screwed us. Absolutely NO communication from Park West Gallery... they just shut it down. I'm not happy at all with how they handled this.
Well, I don't see any mention that Park West now owns the rights to Fine Art Registry. He clearly said, "another company". And according to a search, a company picked up the site recently. Theresa Franks must've sold it for a few dollars to pay for her ticket out of town. The whole thing is crazy. But as was said earlier, Franks kind of dug her own grave. A real company with a board of directors would've probably fired her for being unprofessional. But it was just herself in her home. I feel bad for the artists left in the cold. But this truly is a lesson to be learned: Never trust somebody else with your own career.
ReplyDeleteTeri Franks is the same person who the New Yorker magazine relied on as a main source for an article they published and as a result are now facing a $20M defamation lawsuit. The NY-er's motion to dismiss was denied by the court and it will go to trial. Franks has caused huge damage to the reputation of a once respected publication. Maybe they are the ones who helped rid Franks from the internet and dispose of this catastrophic liability.
ReplyDeleteIt seems Theresa Franks has been unhinged for quite some time. I found this:
ReplyDeletehttp://fineartinvestigations.blogspot.com/p/theresa-franks-criminal-investigation.html?m=1
In my opinion Theresa Franks is a criminal and her entire Fine Art Registry website was an entire sham from the beginning. It was never about art. What a shame, all us artists who keep getting shafted by greedy takers. Total fraud.
ReplyDeleteI have other records of the items I placed in the database, but
ReplyDeleteI am curious as to what will happen to our informaton: images,
sizes, appraisal values, personal information, etc., and what, if any
recourse does one have to find out what has happened to our data.
Is there any representation for the consumers?
You may try contacting the Arizona dept.of Consumer Affairs and the Attorney General. They handle internet fraud and complaints for businesses in the state of Arizona, whers FAR was based.
DeleteThe link is: http://www.azag.gov/consumer/complaintformintro.html
@Anonymous
ReplyDeletei'm replying to the fellow artist who feels like a fool for letting Franks take my money, and let my art into her hands, thank God I didn't give her my originals. the idea is wonderful, but now, it's nothing more than what you'd find in a diaper!!!!! what to do? Can I actually remove these darn things from my art now? How stupid I feel!! How do I find out more, like did she copy the art and sell it? I just found out and I'm so upset.
Mrs.C
smells like a class-action suit is in the mix. not sure if it's worth it though. FAR is obviously busted, broke and on the run. franks should be made to walk the plank for artistic treason.
ReplyDeleteHi all. Removing the useless Fine Art Registry tags is easy. I was agonizing over this for days until my girlfriend suggested steaming them off. Guess what. Bingo! Came off easier than a Band-aid. A suit steamer is probably best but I used an old wallpaper remover steam gun. Any steam-producing thing will work. No more embarrassing FAR tags. Hope this helps.
ReplyDeletePutting a Fine Art Registry tag on your art is like putting Bernard Madoff as a reference on your resume.
ReplyDeleteI heard the Pollock-Krasner foundation threatened a lawsuit against Theresa Franks and Fine Art Registry for offering fake Pollock paintings for sale on the website. Whether that's true or not is yet to be seen. But the site is gone now. Has FAR become the poster child for internet scams? ie fake art, false intentions and no responsibility?
ReplyDeleteThe syllabus being passed out at Art Basel yesterday was devoted to art scams. Fine Art Registry and the crooked Theresa Franks made the front page as "crook of the year".
ReplyDeleteCan anyone suggest an alternative registry to FAR? Or perhaps it is safer to not trust anyone any more?
ReplyDeleteThe concept of a registry makes sense. But think about this: who has access to your private registry? Why give your private information to some company that s a FARce? Most registry and database companies are not interested in protecting your collection but rather gaining info as to what is in your collection and then offering to broker your work to buyers. Take artbrokerage.com for instance. They are basically a database that also offers sales services. Fine Art Registry, which has been outed as a failure and a fraud, is closely tied with artbrokerage.com. They even list FAR as "invited to monitor" their site. In other words, crazy Theresa Franks may have access to your private collection. Better off using a computer program that organizes your collection, and leaving you, your family or attorney or curator in control...and not some heathens.
DeleteThere is only one way to manage your collection in a secure environment. Try using the program, "Past Perfect". DO NOT use any online registry as this is a breeding ground for predators and unscrupulous entities, as we've discovered in the FAR fiasco. More info and free trial here: http://www.museumsoftware.com/ Hope this helps.
ReplyDeleteIt's purely disgusting what happened with Fine Art Registry. Don't trust anyone in the business! Artists unite! Stay away from charlatans and criminal enterprises. Sell your art, be happy. None of these online art promoters are worth a dime. We don't need them!
ReplyDeleteArtists victimized by Theresa Franks & Fine Art Registry unite! Look for class-action update and website soon.
ReplyDeleteI was asked to join the site several years ago but have not been on it in sometime, although I did communicate with Teri from time to time via email.
ReplyDeleteWhat exactly did Teri do that has everyone so enraged? She always had my back when I had a nut-job copying my art and several thousand people after me because of a controversial painting I did.She was there encouraging me not to quit when I was being assaulted all over the net.She even had her attorney call me and offer free advice.
I never really understood the functionality of the tag system for me personally. I could see areas where it needed improvement, but the idea was a good one especially for the print market.Just read the book FAKE and you will know what I mean.
Am I missing something here though? I just realized her site was gone. The article they did on me and my art was fantastic. I got a great deal of net/art mileage out of it and for that I was grateful to Teri. I am positive I got more out of the article than I put into the site financially speaking.
I think you artist here are acting like crybaby's, things happen, move on and if your art is not getting seen, then maybe it's not any good. Teri was fighting for something and came up short, lost her business. That is business,that is life, at least she fought and isn't sitting around crying about it.
She did win the case against Park West and prove they were selling fake Salvador Dali prints,correct? Whatever happened after that I do not know. Maybe she just became broke trying to fight it all? Will there be any facts published about this anywhere? Anything that we can believe?...Yeah, I would probably run away from the net too in that case, what's the point in staying.
The artist posting above makes a good point. To answer his questions: First, Teri Franks did not win the case against Park West and there was never any court decision made in whether fakes were sold through the company. In fact, the giant lawsuit ended up backfiring on her. The judge took away her $500,000 judgement, and according to federal records, she and Park West settled with prejudice. Basically, amid all the lawsuits and unpaid loans, she folded, gave it up. And while that may be understandable, it's also understandable why artists who bought into her system are angry. Not only are they out of money, but their time posting images and buying tags is completely wasted. She never gave any warning either. As captain of the Fine Art Registry "ship", she abandoned it, and left hundreds of artists to sink and drown in the night.
ReplyDeleteShe's also tied up in a major defamation lawsuit with New Yorker Magazine. Apparently, she gave questionable information to the journalist, who took it as fact, and published it. And now since Franks rescinded and retracted her entire site, and her articles, the New Yorker and other publications who ran follow-up stories are left with a very embarrassing and costly situation -- $100Million. And some of the defendants have settled already. In other words, Teri has cost millions and millions of dollars in damages to people all across the earth. Going after big companies was one thing, but turning on artists seem to be her biggest mistake.
So, no one is being a crybaby. If anyone is, it's Teri Franks. But since she's basically "dead", we can only wish her well and hope she finds peace. What's done is done. I agree, everyone should move on from this negativity and focus on what's really important: art!
The articles on Fine Art Registry were at first quite helpful. But over time they became way too emotional and biased. Teri clearly had animus toward certain people and risked everything by defaming them. It was quite uncomfortable I must admit to read such content. It became less professional and more about Teri's daily drama. Turned me off.
ReplyDeleteTo the artist in post #27: Your "controversial painting" is exactly why Teri came to you and wrote an article on you, to generate hits on her site. If she "had your back", as you say, she would've contacted you ahead of time and said "sorry, I'm taking the site down, here's your article, good luck." Never never never put your art and your career in the hands of the unscrupulous.
ReplyDeleteLooks like Theresa Franks has more troubles than we thought. Not sure when this occurred but nonetheless interesting.
ReplyDeletehttp://fineartinvestigations.blogspot.com/p/new-yorker-magazines-source-faces.html
@Anonymous We also are victims of this scammer .. and spent quite a bit of money, we were going to upload the work we did .. and now realize that its all gone :(
ReplyDeleteIf you are looking for an online service, you might consider Provenanced.com . We have been around since 2006 and have helped drive a lot of the art market emphasis on provenance that you see today. Like FAR, we had litigation problems, but ours were due to the divorce of the owners and the ensuing intellectual property battle that formally ended at the end of 2012. Since then, we have completed our change from an online catalog with a marketplace to a 2.0 version which is only open to gallery owners, appraisers and artists that sell their work via a free Point of Sale application that allows you to register your inventory simultaneous to you entry of each work in the application.
ReplyDeleteBecause of the trouble that you went through, we are offering free lifetime provenance services to all former FAR customers via e-mail.
In other words, if you would like to send us your OBJECT ID and other relevant information about your work and an attached photo and any accompanying documents, we will include it in our database. In addition to OBJECT ID information, we do also require a provenance entry, which shouldn't be too hard if the work has not yet been sold.
How we differ from FAR:
1. We do not offer memberships. Lifetime Provenance Services are normally available for a flat fee of $5 per work.
2. We do not delve into the authentication of work. We provide cataloging and provenance services only. You can print bar code tags from the POS application if you desire, however.
3. We additionally have a 2ndary market which is open to gallery owners, dealers, appraisers, and artists that sell their own work. The market is intended over time to allow customers of a gallery in another region or country to work with the gallery or person they originally came to to find works they might be interested in purchasing.
4. Outside of our 2ndary market, which is optional to users, all data is considered private and the provenance database is therefore kept securely offline. Updates or changes can be made for free via e-mail or through the POS. We constantly archive data and at the end of every year create a ledger of works that will likely be sent to the Getty Museum and USC (We are still hammering out specifics as to our partner choice).
5. Our POS will run on Windows, Mac, Linux, IOS, and Android using the google chrome browser.
If you think you might have further questions, please contact me at david.gass@imaginot.com
or check out our website at provenanced.com.
If you would like to try the POS full version as a demo, please let me know as well and I will send you a private url so you can check it out.
Best Regards,
David Gass
President, Provenanced.com, a division of Imaginot LLC
Oregon / California / Mexico / Argentina
it seems that many aboard this site are aggrieved that they lost the ability and monies to examine their art on FAR. Some have even pushed the notion that Teri and FAR somehow duped everyone out of their $3 per work exhibited (I will make the assumption here that all the negative flak has not resulted from those FAR investigated) but artists and other parties not part of the "white collar crime" gang.My last conversation noted that she had no choice but to shut down and leave the art world. The point here is that taking on a multi-million dollar conglomerate does not lead to victory over Goliath but killing one softly by economic and personal ruin.Her task was hopeless up against a system not only operating with impunity but blessed by government, its operatives and the laws. Keep in mind that nothing was done by government for 10 years in the Madoff case, the sitting judge in the FAR suit voided the jury call, and although Teri reported that there were 1000 complaints reported to her re:fraud the policing organization keystone cops continue to sit around for years focusing on their donuts rather than catching the bad guys. The negative audience should really research the problem of white collar crime instead of worrying about the $3 they lost when FAR went down. If they had done any research they would find that more than likely their works can still be seen via the Wayback Machine.
ReplyDeleteDavid, while you may have good intentions, the scandal involving Theresa Franks and Fine Art Registry is enough to scare any artist, or collector from every registering their works to a third-party website, yours included. Think about it: if you're a collector, would you want someone else peering into your private provenance records? And even if you didn't mind, how would you be certain this entity wouldn't just disappear into thin air, along with your private and intellectual property, like FAR did to so many artists and collectors? It's just a waste of time David. In a way, we should be thankful to Theresa Franks for teaching us a lesson to never trust ANYONE with our art.
ReplyDeleteI gave FAR 20 images of my original paintings. I also paid my last dues in August, 2012. The dues was, I believe automatic renewal. Where are the images to my original paintings and where is my confidential information??
ReplyDeleteThis is a shock...what recourse does an artist/consumer have thinking that I was putting my livelihood in an art registry hands, thinking that my work was being protected. Another organization (Park West Gallery) has possession of my work/confidential information??
This is not right...all artists/consumers listed on this site should have been notified of this "takeover" and, at least, given the option of removing their information. This Park West Gallery sounds just as irresponsible as FAR. Has anyone anyone any information in regards to what Park West Gallery intends to do with our work and information???? Help!!!????
What happened to my artwork pictures and personal information??
ReplyDelete@Anonymous
ReplyDeleteI would agree with you that privacy is key with regards to customer confidence. That is why our design, which incidentally preceded Christie's and Southeby's online provenance information is similar and does not reveal the name or details about the owner. Any private information is kept offline. It may still be a little uncomfortable for some people, but if you do a quick check on one of the major auction sites (at least it was there recently), you will see the sanitized information available.
Our point is that if you don't have third party-neutral provenance information, the value of the painting for the buyer does go down over what it would be if you do. As we used to cover a few other industries in addition to fine arts, we know that the actual provenance information that comes out of many sources aside from the artist is not always that valid.
Unfortunately, even automobiles and video games have better established provenance than many works of art.
As far as online companies are concerned it can be hit or miss. Our own company verified that developers at 'let's just say an Arizona based-firm' stole our features as they were under development and included them in one of their updates that hit right about the time we went to market. Interestingly enough, it was a horrible idea for a feature that seemed good for a few hours and then was stripped out of the code after our team realized no one would want that feature that tipped us off that the code had been stolen because that feature ended up in the Arizona company's release.
So even when you thought you were being treated well, it may have been the case that the sanctity of respecting intellectual property was somewhat situational.
In any case, from our quarter, our offer remains and I am always happy to answer any questions or concerns that you may have.
Quick Facts:
- I run a worldwide research group on Information Ethics
- I've worked for Symantec, Intel, Netscape, HP, Abbot Labs, Nokia and many other fortune 500 firms in engineering.
- We've been open since 2006
Best Regards,
David Gass
Provenanced.com
What are we supposed to do if our collections (as artists) were all in this website? what about the lie that the registry is a "permanent" tagging system for our legacy? there are artists like myself that opted for not having our own collection websites aside from FAR becuase of the promise of it running always...
ReplyDeletewhat do we do now? how do retrieve images and information of artwork we no longer have physically and only had those images?
email please: h v j r @ l i v e . c o m
thanks!
I bought a Trail of Painted Pony from a lady and had it authenticated by FAR and I wanted to transfer ownership to me. Is there a way with FAR gone?
ReplyDelete