4.3 Costs of publication

In 2005, the typical hardcover art history-related title (published by an academic press) was about300 pages long with just over 90 illustrations. Of course, typical page lengths varied from publisher to publisher, ranging from 250to 400, while the typical number of illustrations varied from 40 to 200. (Additional information about minimum and maximum page lengthsand numbers of illustrations may be found in the annotated questionnaire in Appendix E .)

The typical hardcover art history-related title also contained both color and black and white illustrations;the eleven university press editors who responded to the survey reported that, on average, 53% of their titles contained both colorand black and white illustrations. Again, this varied widely from publisher to publisher, from 10% on the low side to 90% on the highside.

With these parameters in mind (300 pages, 90 illustrations, mixture of color and b/w illustrations), universitypress editors estimated the total cost of publishing a "typical" hardcover art history-related title at $41,438. (This is based onthe responses of 8 editors who provided cost estimates for both illustrated and non-illustrated books.) By contrast, the total costof publishing a typical hardcover title without illustrations was estimated at $23,000. On average, then, illustrated titles wereestimated to cost about 80% more to produce than non-illustrated titles.

Interestingly, this specific ratio (that is, illustrated titles costing 80% more than non-illustrated titles)was not representative of any of the eight presses for which these figures were reported. Four presses reported ratios in the range of117 to 138%, while four reported ratios in the range of 50 to 67%. In other words, there appear to be at least two different workingmodels in use at university presses for the publication of illustrated books, one of which is substantially more costly (andone might assume, more elaborate) than the other.

Part of the higher costs associated with publishing illustrated books comes from having to pay permissionsfees for the use of illustrations. All but one of the university press editors surveyed said that permissions costs had risen overthe past ten years or so, but most said that these increases were not necessarily exorbitant. Several editors did say, however, thatthe process of dealing with permissions issues was becoming more onerous, involving both more work and more pressure to adhere toregulations.

University presses "rarely" pay permission costs, though. Such costs almost always fall to the authors ofpublications or to the authors' institutions. Managing the permissions process does involve significant investments of time atsome university presses, while some presses spend very little time at all on this. For a typical art history-related title, the amountof time spent by press personnel on managing the permissions process ranged from "almost none" to "25% of one staff person'stime." A very rough average across university presses would be about 40 hours of staff time per title.

Publishers of art history-related titles have long relied on subventions to cover a portion of the costs relatedto publishing in this area. University press editors estimated that just over half (54%) of such titles published in 2005 receivedsubventions, and that these subventions covered just under one-fifth (18%) of all publication costs in this area. Most editorsagreed that subventions are "as available as they used to be," but several noted that it takes diligence to obtain them.

Sources of subventions mentioned by these editors included the Millard Meiss Fund (CAA), the KressFoundation, the Graham Foundation, the Driehaus Foundation, the Getty Foundation, the NEH, the Dedalus Foundation, the NewberryLibrary, the Wyeth Foundation, the Medieval Academy, the Kaplan Fund, the Paul Mellon Centre, as well as authors' homeinstitutions, museums and, in a couple of cases, "in-house endowment funds." One editor noted that some subventions come fromorganizations that fund projects in specific regions (e.g., the Japan Foundation). Others noted that subventions may also come fromprivate collectors, foreign ministries of culture and corporations. One editor said that, as a matter of course, "I always encourage myauthors to talk to their chair/dean/vice president of research about funding. There is always a little money, even at the worst oftimes (and 2001-2004 qualified as 'worst of times')."