Barcelona / Catalan masters and counter commissions
For a Barcelona gallery, the first check is the copyright line on a Museu Nacional d’Art de Catalunya (MNAC) record. For a framer, it is the deposit written on a customer’s quote.
Barcelona galleries who want Casas, Rusiñol or Mir on their walls start at MNAC, and framers who take a customer’s photo and deposit start with the Catalan Consumer Code.
PaletteMomento is a hand-painting studio in Dafen Art Village, Shenzhen, China, supplying trade buyers worldwide. Each canvas is painted by hand on linen, with no printed base, and orders start at one painting.
Our fastest way to discuss your schedule and price. The written quote follows by email for your records.
WhatsApp: usually an immediate reply.
Email: usually within 12 hours. Monday–Sunday.
support@palettemomento.comOr send your brief through our quote form.
01 / Check the master
A range of Catalan master copies starts with one question. Is the painter’s work free to copy in Spain?
A painter who died more than 70 years ago may still be protected here. Spain’s Intellectual Property Law keeps an 80-year term for Spanish artists who died before December 1987. That rule sits in its fourth transitional provision. The Generalitat de Catalunya’s communication guide gives the same 80 years in its chapter on copyright.
You do not have to work out every date yourself. MNAC, the National Art Museum of Catalonia in Barcelona, prints a copyright line on its catalog records. Read that line for each artist before the subject goes on your order list. The list can change, so we suggest checking again each January.
02 / Set the deposit, then the order
A framer who sells photo-to-painting commissions works with two sets of terms. Your customer pays you, and you pay us.
Our trade terms usually ask your shop for a 50% deposit. The balance follows your approval of the finished painting, before shipping. Your customer’s deposit is a separate matter, and Catalan consumer law shapes it.
Article 211-7 of the Catalan Consumer Code says any advance must be stated beforehand, on the quote or on a sign in the shop. Where advances go above 25% of the total and also above €100, the code asks for cover to refund them.
| Your customer deposit | What it means for your studio orders |
|---|---|
| 25% of the total or less, or €100 or less | Compare it with our usual 50% deposit on your order. Any gap comes from your own cash, so count how many open commissions that allows at once. |
| Above 25% of the total and above €100 | Arrange the refund cover first, with your adviser. After that, a larger customer deposit can carry more of each studio deposit. |
A small customer deposit keeps things simple at the counter. It may also leave part of each studio deposit to your own cash, depending on your price to the customer. How many commissions you can run at once follows from that choice.
Article 123-2(c) of the code covers work whose price cannot be fixed exactly in advance. There, the written quote states a validity period and an approximate completion date, and it binds the business until it expires. Your adviser can tell you whether your commissions fall under it.
OMIC Barcelona, the city’s consumer office, also tells businesses that a written quote is binding. Its guidance on when a quote must be given differs for services and for product sales.
For a deposit given as “paga i senyal”, OMIC’s answers for consumers say the customer may ask for double the amount paid if the business cannot supply. That is the office’s guidance, so ask your adviser how it fits your own deposit terms.
Before any painting ships, you see daylight photos of every finished canvas and approve them. That is the moment to hold each photo against the quote you wrote for your customer: subject, size and presentation.
Your quote, deposit receipt and invoice should all describe the painting as ordered. Article 128-1 of the code and Article 32.3 of Catalan Law 1/1998 cover the language of these documents and of shop signs, so ask your adviser which languages yours need.
If something does not match, tell us before the balance is paid. Our painting process page explains how each canvas is made.
Two catalog paintings. Our written quote sets out each painting and its presentation, so your counter documents can match it.
03 / Quote
The answer changes what we ask you for. A range is built from MNAC records. A counter commission is built from one customer’s photo.
You are welcome to send both in one message if your shop does both.
04 / Catalan rules at the counter
Yes: Spanish copyright terms run to 31 December, so a Catalan painter’s work can clear in Spain on 1 January. By our count, Sert cleared on 1 January 2026, and Pidelaserra follows on 1 January 2027. Joaquim Sunyer, who died in 1956, waits longer. By our count, a life-plus-70 test would clear him on 1 January 2027, but his work stays protected in Spain until the end of 2036. Each January, read MNAC’s line again for any painter you hope to add to the range.
MNAC lists the 1897 tandem at 188 x 215.5 cm, oil on canvas, so a half-size copy keeps its shape at about 94 x 108 cm. Tell us whether it should ship rolled for your own stretching, or stretched. Rolled, it carries an extra 5 cm of blank canvas on every side, so the canvas measures about 104 x 118 cm.
One painter in our studio in Dafen Art Village, Shenzhen, paints each canvas for a Barcelona framer from the first marks to the last. You stay the seller to your customer, and we supply your shop. Our usual 50% deposit is between your shop and us, separate from the deposit your customer pays you.
Where Article 123-2(c) of the Catalan Consumer Code applies, the customer’s quote gives an approximate completion date and the expected duration of the work. Take that date from the feasible date we confirm for your actual order, then add your own framing time. If your customer needs the painting sooner, ask us about rush production before you write the quote.
Article 123-2(d) of the Catalan Consumer Code describes a receipt for an item left for work, naming the object, the work, the handover date and the expected completion date. Your adviser can confirm how it applies to a frame. For the painting, send us the frame’s inside opening so we size the image to it. Our guide for frame shops covers the rest.
Your MNAC list or your customer’s photo
A gallery can open with the MNAC record links for its range. A framer can open with one customer’s photo and the frame it will hang in.
Our fastest way to discuss your schedule and price. The written quote follows by email for your records.
WhatsApp: usually an immediate reply.
Email: usually within 12 hours. Monday–Sunday.
support@palettemomento.comOr send your brief through our quote form.