"Verified" isn't a badge we put on the homepage and leave unexplained. Here is exactly what happens before an artist can list, before a sale is final, and if something goes wrong.
Every applicant submits a portfolio and verified ID before their first listing goes live. This is the floor, not the ceiling — it confirms who someone is, not yet the market value of their work.
Artists with a documented exhibition or sales history are reviewed against it before being eligible for Gallery auctions, where reserve prices and buyer trust matter most.
Any piece listed above $10,000 gets independent provenance research before it can go to auction — the same threshold used by major auction houses to decide a lot needs a paper trail, not just a signature.
Every artist starts at Tier 1. Higher tiers are earned by sales history and documentation, not paid for.
This is the process we verify against as artists join. Sample listings shown elsewhere on the site are marked “Example” and are not verified artists.
A Certificate of Authenticity is issued on every completed sale, signed by the artist who made the work. It isn't a marketing document; it's the record you'd want if you ever needed to insure, resell, or authenticate the piece again — and it lives at a permanent address on this site, so it can be checked rather than taken on trust.
Certificates begin with the first completed sale on the platform. No sales have taken place yet, so none have been issued. The lookup is live: check a certificate number whenever you have one.
Payment is held — not released to the artist — for seven days after delivery is confirmed. That window exists so you can unpack and inspect the piece before the sale is final. If it arrived damaged, or doesn't match its listing, you report it inside that window and the funds are still held while we look at it.
Artists arrange their own shipping, so we don't promise a particular carrier. What we do require: every shipment must be tracked, and work valued over $1,000 must be insured for its full value. Tracking is what starts your inspection clock, and it's what makes a damage claim possible at all — so an untracked shipment doesn't release payment to the artist.
Worth knowing: most standard carriers cap their liability on fine art well below its value — FedEx limits declared value on artwork to $1,000. That is why cover above that threshold has to be arranged separately, and why we ask artists to photograph work as it's packed.
Every piece in The Gallery and The Store was listed under this process.