What is a Giclee or Iris print?
A Giclee (pronounced Gee Clay) print is a piece of artwork reproduced on canvas or paper by using a high quality digital ink printer. Iris printing is a specific form of Giclee printing. Giclee is a term to describe fine art inkjet printing. There are many types of printers used to create Giclee prints. The Iris printer is considered the highest quality printer for this form of printing. Giclee is a French term, loosely translated to “to spray”. In this way it is an appropriate description of the Iris printing method. The term was created to differentiate a commercial standard from the work of a fine art print. The fine art prints made on an Iris printer are made with higher quality inks and are printed on fine watercolor papers or canvas. The method for coaxing a fine art print from the Iris printer is a delicate work far removed from the Iris’s original purpose of printing color proofs for offset lithographers. The Iris is a large drum based inkjet printer made up of a complex array
