Reading the Labels
Certain painter entries and gallery links carry a small tag. The tag exists to answer one question: who is paid when you click through.
Partner marks a painter or gallery represented by an outside platform. Click through and buy, and that platform pays us a commission out of its own margin. The price you see is the price either way — the fee is deducted on their side, never added to yours.
A share of those Partner links resolve to RakovGallery, with which we hold an affiliate arrangement. We have no ownership in it and we sell no work of our own. Purchases made there through our link pay us on exactly the terms described above, with nothing added to your total.
Anything without a tag pays us nothing at all: internal links, museum collections, auction records, and the reference material behind each survey.
Commission, Stated Plainly
Per the FTC endorsement guides, treat every Partner tag as an affiliate link that earns us a commission on a sale. No commission has ever bought a mention, a ranking, or a row in the matrix. The sequence runs in one direction only: the survey is written and the painters are picked on the strength of the work, and only afterwards does anyone check whether an arrangement exists. A painter we would not name without the fee does not get named because of it.
The Bar a Partner Has to Clear
A platform earns the Partner tag only after it clears three tests, all of which we re-check periodically:
- Terms for the painters. A defensible revenue split, honest attribution of every canvas, and no pressure to overproduce for the sake of turnover.
- Terms for the buyer. Published prices, condition reports on request, and shipping and returns written in plain language.
- The quality of the roster. The work has to stand on its own within the movement it belongs to. A generous rate attached to a thin catalogue is a straightforward no.
Placement is not for sale, and no partner reads a survey before it goes live. When a platform slips below the bar, the links come down. That has happened, and it will happen again.
Corrections and Queries
Spotted a link that should carry a tag and doesn't, or want something on this page explained further? Write to desk@beautifulart.us. The inbox is read by an editor, not a ticketing queue.