A buyer asked me to send the painting first and pay after it sells

Somebody messaged me last week, very polite, saying they have a small shop in Delhi and would like to keep two of my paintings, and settle the payment after a sale happens. Consignment, they called it.

Myself I did not know the English word for it, so I asked my son and he explained. Then I sat with it for two days.

The thing is, a painting leaving my hand is not like a shirt going to a shop. Each one takes me near one month. The fish border on the last one I did, I drew it four times before I was satisfied, and the black is lamp soot mixed by hand, not from a bottle. If it sits in a shop for one year and comes back with a corner bent, what is my position ji. I have no shop, no godown, no insurance.

But also I understand their side. Small shop, they cannot buy outright from every artist.

I said yes to one painting only, not two, and I wrote in the message that if it is not sold in three months it comes back to me and I keep it. They agreed. Whether I was clever or foolish I am still not sure. If anybody here has done this arrangement, kindly tell me how it went for you.

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Inês Costa·2h

The four attempts at the fish border is what I keep coming back to. That is not stock sitting in a shop, and I think you already knew that before you looked up the word.

Consignment is real, but it usually comes from someone who has seen the work in person and has a space you can go and look at. A polite message from a stranger asking to hold two months of your hands before any money moves is a different thing wearing the same name. The lamp soot alone tells you what kind of object it is.

Two days of sitting with it is not indecision, it is your answer arriving slowly. I would say trust that.

Mira Vey·1h

Agreed on all of it except the last line. consignment isn't the problem, the fact that he's never seen the shop is. any arrangement where the work leaves your hands needs one thing: you standing in the room. if he can't show you a wall, there's nothing to consign to.

the lamp soot is the part that got me too. you can't get that back from a shop in Delhi that decides to close.

Ramesh JhaOP·1h

You are correct, ji. I was putting the fault on the consignment itself, but the fault is that there is no wall, no room, nothing I can put my eyes on. A shop I cannot see is only a story told politely in a message.

And that is the thing about the soot. Once it goes, the black in that border cannot be mixed again the same way, not even by me. So the wall must be seen before anything leaves my hand. Thank you for putting it so plainly.

Ramesh JhaOP·1h

You are right, ji, that I knew it before the word. The word only gave me a place to put the doubt so that I could look at it properly.

And your point about the shop I have not seen is the one that settles it. Whatever name we give the arrangement, I should be able to stand in that room. If he is serious he will not mind my son and me coming to see it, and if he minds, then the answer is already there.

Thank you for reading it so carefully. It helps to hear it said plainly by somebody who understands what goes into the work.

Camille Laurent·2h

The polite ones are always the ones to watch. Consignment is a real arrangement, it exists, galleries do it and it is not automatically a swindle. But two paintings on a wall in a shop you have never seen, three thousand kilometres away, with no written terms on who insures them, who pays if the shop floods or closes, and how long they sit before you may take them back? That is not consignment, that is a loan to a stranger.

What I would say, and I say it as someone who has done both: if you want to try, put it in writing. A date, a price you set and do not let them discount, insurance on their side, and an agreement that unsold work comes back at your cost after six months. If they balk at the paper, you have your answer about the shop.

But the fish border, four times, the soot mixed by hand. That is a month of your life on their wall earning nothing while they see if they can sell it. Not every painting has to leave the house on the first offer, that is all.

Ramesh JhaOP·1h

This is the thing I was not able to say properly, ji. Loan to a stranger. The word consignment made it sound like a business matter and I was thinking it was my mistake to be doubtful. You have put it plainly.

Insurance, who pays if the shop floods, how long before I may take them back. I had not even thought of the flooding part. In our area the whole stock can be gone in one night of water, and here I was worrying only about the money.

I am going to write it down as you say. Date, price fixed by me, and the returning date also. If he is a serious man he will not mind a paper. If he minds the paper, then the paper has told me something.