Creating a flawless artist invoice: the mandatory details

Why the invoice is indispensable

An invoice is not a simple receipt scribbled on a scrap of paper. It is a legal document attesting to the reality of a commercial transaction between two parties. For the buyer, it constitutes proof of purchase that may be necessary for insuring the work, for a future resale, for a tax declaration in the case of a professional purchase, or for establishing the work's provenance for collection purposes. A serious collector will always request an invoice, and its absence can constitute a barrier to purchase for someone investing several hundred or thousands of euros in a work.

For you, the invoice constitutes an essential accounting document for your income declaration and for justifying your revenue to social authorities. In the event of a tax audit, invoices issued and received are the documents the administration requests first. An artist who sells without invoicing exposes themselves to an adjustment whose amount can be considerable, especially if uninvoiced sales accumulate over several years.

Daniel Buren has always insisted on administrative rigour in managing his career. This discipline, far from being a brake on creation, is what allows an artist to focus on work without fearing tax audits or commercial disputes. A properly made invoice protects both parties and professionalises your approach in the eyes of the market.

Not issuing an invoice is an offence. The Commercial Code requires the establishment of an invoice for any sale of goods or provision of services between professionals, and the Tax Code requires it to justify declared operations. Even for a sale to a private individual, issuing a receipt or invoice is a good practice that protects you in case of subsequent dispute over the price, authenticity or conditions of the sale.

Mandatory details for an artist-author

Your invoice must include a number of details required by the Commercial Code and the Tax Code. The absence of any of these can result in a fine and make the invoice contestable in court.

The first detail is your complete identity: surname, first name, studio or home address, and your SIRET registration number. This fourteen-digit number identifies your activity with the administration. If you work under an artist name different from your civil identity, you must include both: the artist name for commercial identification and the civil name for the legal validity of the document. Invader, for example, maintains the distinction between his civil identity on administrative documents and his pseudonym on public communications. This dual mention is a legal obligation, not an aesthetic choice.

The second detail is the invoice number. This number must follow a continuous chronological sequence, with no gaps or duplicates. You can use a simple system: the year followed by a sequential number. For example, 2026-001, 2026-002, and so on. This number is the key to your accounting: it allows you to find any transaction in your records and prove to the administration that you have not deleted invoices to conceal sales. A gap in the sequence is a warning signal for the tax auditor.

The third detail is the invoice issue date and the sale date if it differs. In practice, for an artwork sale, the invoice date often corresponds to the transaction or delivery date. If the sale takes place at a fair in March but the work is delivered in April, it is prudent to mention both dates.

The fourth detail is the buyer's identity: name or company name, full address. If the buyer is a professional, their registration number or intra-Community VAT number must appear on the invoice. This information is indispensable for the buyer to deduct the purchase from their professional expenses and for the transaction to be traceable by the administration.

The fifth detail is the precise description of the work sold. This point is crucial for artists and is the one most often deficient. You cannot simply write "a painting" or "a picture." The invoice must allow the work to be identified without ambiguity: title, technique used, dimensions in centimetres, year of creation, and possibly reference number in your catalogue raisonne. For example: "Nocturnal landscape no. 7, oil on canvas, 120 x 80 cm, 2025, ref. NL-007." This precision is also useful for the work's provenance: in twenty years, this invoice could be the centrepiece of a provenance file for an auction resale or a loan request for an exhibition.

The VAT question

VAT is the point that generates the most confusion among artist-authors, and rightly so because the rules are specific to this profession. If you benefit from the basic VAT exemption, which is the case as long as your receipts stay below the applicable threshold, you do not charge VAT. But you must include the mandatory note on your invoice: "VAT not applicable, article 293 B of the CGI." This mention is imperative and its absence constitutes an offence. It can be penalised by a fine and risks leading the buyer to believe that VAT is included in the price, which would be problematic if the buyer is a professional seeking to deduct it.

If you have exceeded the exemption threshold and are subject to VAT, you charge the reduced rate of five point five per cent for direct sales of your original works. This reduced rate is a specific advantage for artist-authors that many are unaware of. Original works in the fiscal sense include paintings, drawings and pastels, collages, engravings, prints, lithographs, sculptures, hand-woven tapestries, original ceramics, copper enamels and art photographs printed by the artist or under their control in limited editions of thirty copies. Mechanical reproductions, derivative products and services such as courses or workshops do not benefit from this reduced rate and are subject to the standard rate.

An important technical detail: if you sell through a gallery that purchases the work for resale (firm purchase, not consignment), the gallery applies the margin scheme and not the reduced rate. In that case, the gallery handles VAT and you do not need to worry about it. But if the gallery operates on consignment, you are selling directly and your VAT regime applies. The distinction between firm purchase and consignment is therefore essential.

Selling to a foreign professional

If you sell a work to a collector or gallery based in another European Union country, the VAT rules differ. Intra-Community delivery is in principle exempt from VAT under certain conditions, notably that the buyer holds a valid intra-Community VAT number and that the work physically leaves French territory. You must retain proof of shipment: transport slip, proof of receipt, customs documents if applicable. Pierre Soulages, whose works sell worldwide, always maintained rigorous fiscal management of international sales, which is indispensable for avoiding double taxation and disputes with tax administrations in multiple countries.

For sales outside the European Union, the work is exported and the sale is exempt from VAT. You must also retain proof of export, generally the EX1 customs document stamped by customs. Without this proof, the tax administration can reclassify the sale as a domestic sale and demand VAT retroactively.

Payment terms and conditions

Your invoice must specify payment conditions: accepted payment method (bank transfer with your IBAN details, cheque, cash within the legal limit of one thousand euros between professionals), payment date or deadline, and any late payment penalties. Details regarding late payment penalties and the fixed forty-euro compensation for recovery costs are mandatory between professionals. For a sale to a private individual, they are not required but remain recommended.

Payment deadlines between professionals are regulated by law. In France, the deadline cannot exceed sixty days from the invoice issue date, except by express special agreement. For a gallery that sells your work and remits your share, the consignment contract must specify the remittance deadline, which is often thirty days after the actual sale. If this deadline is not respected, late payment penalties apply automatically.

The certificate of authenticity and record keeping

The certificate of authenticity is not strictly a detail on the invoice, but it is strongly recommended to accompany the invoice when selling an original work. This document, signed by the artist, attests that the work is indeed by their hand, that it is original and authentic. It includes the identification details of the work: title, technique, dimensions, date of creation, catalogue number if applicable, and the artist's handwritten signature. Yayoi Kusama issues certificates of authenticity managed by her studio, and these documents have become as important as the works themselves on the secondary market, where any doubt about authenticity can cause a piece's value to plummet catastrophically.

For record keeping, the law requires you to retain a copy of each invoice issued for ten years. This period starts from the invoice date, not the sale date. Digital format is accepted provided the document's integrity is guaranteed. A PDF scan filed in a folder organised by year and invoice number is a simple and sufficient practice.

Tools for simple invoicing

You do not need sophisticated accounting software to create compliant invoices. An invoice template in a word processor or spreadsheet, customised with your details and filled in for each sale, is more than sufficient for an artist who sells a few works per year. The essential thing is that all mandatory details are present and that numbering is sequential.

If you prefer a dedicated tool, free or inexpensive invoicing software allows you to generate compliant invoices in a few clicks and archive them automatically. The important thing is to choose a tool you will actually use. The best invoicing solution is the one you will not postpone until tomorrow, because every uninvoiced sale is an administrative time bomb.

Artedusa simplifies the administrative management of your sales by providing a structured framework for presenting and selling your works. Every transaction on the platform is documented, which facilitates your invoicing and year-end accounting. Discover artedusa.com.