What is your fine art worth?

Researched valuation of fine art — prints, lithographs, engravings, paintings and works on paper. Attribution and condition checks, cited auction comparables.

Fine art covers paintings, drawings, sculpture and original prints. Each has its own rules of attribution and its own condition vocabulary. Pick a sub-category below to see the form your written report will take.

Fine art is the broad category for the things made to be looked at rather than used: paintings, drawings and watercolours, sculpture, and the original prints that carried artists' images into the world in multiples. Each has its own rules of attribution and its own condition vocabulary, and each rewards a researched figure over a guess.

Our written report covers attribution (the documented artist, workshop, engraver or publisher, and how confident that attribution is); the evidence that ties the work to a catalogue or a documented edition; condition in the language of the material (toning, foxing and mat burn on paper; craquelure, relining and overpaint on canvas); and three to five cited comparable sales from the auction houses and specialist dealers. Pick a sub-category below to see the form your report will take.

Where fine-art value comes from

Three factors define the figure on almost every work. Attribution — a work securely tied to a named artist outprices 'circle of', 'follower of' or 'after' by an order of magnitude or more, and for prints the equivalent is the documented edition against the unsigned reproduction. Rarity within the attribution — a unique painting, a small numbered edition, an early state. Condition and originality of surface — on paper, whether the sheet has been trimmed, toned or restored; on canvas, whether the paint surface is the artist's own. Our report names the language category by category and says which checks still need the object in hand.

Upload photos of the work, the signature or inscriptions, and the back, and we'll send back a documented valuation with the comparable sales we used — lot number, hammer price and venue — drawn from Christie's, Sotheby's, Phillips, Bonhams, Swann, Heritage and the specialist salerooms. We state a confidence level on the figure and tell you what would move it. We don't buy and we don't take consignment. Your first valuation is on us.

Reviewed by The Findthevalueof research team. Last reviewed 23 Sep 2026.

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