Buying works of art can become an expensive habit, but what if you didn’t have to buy the artworks and instead lease them for however long you wanted? That’s the premise of an ingenious Japanese business that lets people rent paintings.

Casie is an innovative service that connects painters and art lovers in a whole new way. Instead of brokering the sale of artworks it offers clients the possibility of leasing them by the month. It sounds a bit strange, maybe because it just hasn’t been done before, but if people can rent designer clothes and expensive jewelry, why can’t they do the same with art? Apparently, this model benefits both artists, who are able to generate more revenue from their works in the long term, and clients, who get to keep the paintings until they get bored of them and decided to swap them for new ones.

Photo: pieonane/Pixabay

Casie founder, Sho Fujimoto, said that the business model was inspired by a personal experience. His father was a struggling painter who didn’t generate enough revenue to support the family, so they relied on his mother paycheck to get by. The experienced made Sho focus on ways of disrupting the art business, and Casie is a result of that.

In the two years that it has been in operation, Casie has grown steadily, becoming more popular every day. Today, the company has an average monthly turnover of over 10 million yen ($91,000), and works with a large number of Japanese painters, both novices and experienced, most of whom are extremely happy about the partnership.

If before, many artists struggled to sell enough artworks to get by, Casie’s painting lease model has improved things significantly. Because of the more affordable short-time price, more people are willing to spend money on art, which makes young artists more confident in their future.