To refuse to pay for this commission?

@Legendairy

Thank you! 😊

Tell her don't be ridiculous, our agreement was no signature, are you able to paint out the signature without ruining the picture or am I going to another artist?

May I ask if you do cats? 🐈‍⬛

you need to launch yourself as a an animal painting artist! Tell sis you've been inspired by her!!

OP, YANBU! Don't pay unless she corrects it!

BUT, like many others on here, I love your hilarious art! I'd pay you for a couple of cat portraits. Also, do your skills stretch to gerbils and fish?

course they do. op does all sorts of animals. I shall take over from here as op's self-appointed agent, all commissions to be sent via myself, much obliged.

I am an artist. And she is right , you are wrong. You KNEW what her drawings look like! You KNEW about the signatures. You CHOSE her drawing. But you want it in some other style that suits you etc.
For future - choose artist by their style and dont make artists change their style for you. That is her own expression. And she needs to get paid yes.

Looking at that mock-up, if that's smaller than her usual signature it's no wonder people complained! It's massive!

Can't believe people on here saying you should pay (and then let her keep the picture?! Maybe sell it on and get twice the money?). So she spent a long time on it - that is not the customer's problem. £200 may be a good price for a commissioned portrait, if it were the portrait you had in fact commissioned rather than a backdrop for her ego trip. As it is you'd be rewarding her failure to deliver the agreed item and she'll just carry on doing it. What a shame she insists on sabotaging her own great talent.

Hi OP's sister.

Are you the artist in question? 😂 If you read the original post, OP was questioned by sister as to why she'd not gone to her for the art piece, she said why and sister convinced her to commission her on the basis that she would not include the obnoxiously big signature. I am also an artist. Considering your clientele is important and you can't just agree to something that you don't really want to do and then do what you want instead.

Yes, because no artists ever has just painted what they want all the time. Even Michelangelo et Al were commissioned by the church/ rich people.

Ah shes beeing a d.too but yea 😂as an artist u know then.. you'll draw something for someone and at the end they'll say - aaaah, i dont like this. But still keep it and hang it on their wall.

If they're going to keep the work then yes, they should pay, that's fair enough. But if it's got something on it they specifically discussed not wanting, and showed the customer the picture without it, then when it turned up it had the thing they didn't want, then surely the customer is within their rights to return it and not pay a bean? When I order things online (which, to be fair, is not often) and what turns up isn't what I ordered, I expect a refund, and UK consumer legislation agrees with me.

Oh shush! 😂 So am I!

Yes, she did want it in another style because it suited her, and that is why if the artist really objects to this they should say NO. If she still wanted to do the commission, the responsible thing to do would be to speak to the client before the signature was put on, or make a rough digital mock version first. Especially given there were doubts over the signature aspect. It would be different with something more complicated, but this would have been so easy for her to do.

She shouldn't have done something she bloody well knew would probably be an issue and then go 'Now pay up'.

@LindyLou2020 Love your work! I have PM'd you.

I'm a professional artist and I do commissions, have been doing them for decades.

An artist should agree with a client in advance on what is to be done.

[In my case I do regular consultations at various stages, not just the beginning, but my work is often complex, large, and expensive, and my clients may wish to see several options at drawing or sketch stage and choose which to take forward; I actually enjoy working with clients in that way in order that they get exactly what they want. But all that comes expensive.]

If the client wants something different to what an artist is willing/able to do, the artist should refuse the commission.

I work on the basis that a client can reject a commission at any stage without charge, as this protects the client, but few artists will do this for obvious reasons- it doesn't protect the artist from timewasters. It does mean, though, that I am fussy about who I work for- if I think a client would just mess me about and walk away, I don't accept a commission from them. (For the record, I've never had one rejected.)

If a client asks me to do something I'm not happy about doing, I politely suggest they find someone else. If they want something I could do, but I know an artist who would be better suited to the job, I will pass them on.

I'm an artist and I could not disagree more. The signature was discussed at the beginning and an agreement was made. Dictum meum pactum. Deliver the goods as agreed or don't expect payment.

Quoting the OP So I agreed for her to do it as long as she doesn’t put a massive signature on it.

The mistake on the OPs side was not being specific about how intrusive the signature should be. But the artist ought not to have accepted the commission without nailing down exactly what was meant either.

For the record, I think big signatures are cheesy.

Wrong, verbal contracts are still enforceable. But if what was delivered wasn't what was ordered, then the contract hasn't been met.

Don't accept it op. That would totally ruin it. What a strange sister you have.

No she does not need paying. She ruined the painting and specifically did what she agreed not to do.

You're suggesting that 200 quid is expensive?
Hahahahahahaah.
How long do you think a decent portrait takes to do? Then compare that with the rate for a decent tradesman of any other sort.....

200 quid is not expensive in art terms, at least for a professional job. At the extreme, there are watercolour paintbrushes that cost 3x that (yes I know, but there are, and even those I use cost about 20-35 quid each) , though of course oil brushes cost less (good job because you need lots more of them). One small tube of pro-quality oil paint costs between 8-35 quid, depending on the colour. Then there is canvas, stretchers, primer, etc.- and if the work is framed, the frame, which, again, for a pro job would start at about 60 quid for a small one in a modest narrow moulding. It's not at all unusual for my frames to cost £200+.

Just as an aside, I wonder how many people here know that most galleries take between 40% and 50% of the on-the-wall price?

I love them too!

Yes, I thought this ridiculous comment must be from the sister too. But, in the unlikely event that you're not:

@Somerandomgirl, you're talking shite. OP's contract with her sister was "I agreed for her to do it as long as she doesn’t put a massive signature on it." Her sister has therefore broken the contract and OP is not liable to complete her side of it.

I'm not keen on signing work, but my dealer and clients insist, so I do it small, initials only, in one corner.

You mean after they paid for it, or you didn't charge? Either way, that's weird.
My policy is if at the end you don't like, it you pay nothing, but I keep the picture. That way, at worst you may have a disappointed client, but they're not out of pocket as well. And nobody uses not liking it as an excuse to get a job done for free, or cheap. Far to say, I've never had anyone not like mine, but I am careful to involve clients in what I do as I do it, so everyone knows where they are.