The Magic Ink & Disposable Culture

[Michael Newberry]

Excellent article. Thanks!

Can someone tell me the currently supposed archival limits on negatives? ---assuming you wash them "appropriately", of course. Chemical removal is an exponential process but, at some point, the residue can be reduced below a threshold of being problematic.

I've played with plates from the 1930's and they still look great, except for mechanical damage. The positive representation we view as the end product f the artistic expression is the energy source that drives the continually changing technology. Unfortunately, what is long term is not what sells to the masses, else there wouldn't be enough people continully pumping new money into the economy.

The point I want to add to what's been said is that perhaps, as long as we can preserve the negs for a long time and that there remain dedicated craftsmen who can print them [almost] as well as the original printer, then the archivabilbity of prints, pigments, and processes becomes secondary. This assumes, of course, that art worth preserving becomes successful enough "in its time" to lead to a master/apprentice arrangement for "seeing" positives that express the negatives as originally intended.

Michael

[steve_782]

The fallacy of the entire argument based on "I have a box full of old photos," etc. and other anecdotal "proof" is that the photographers who made the images 80 years ago, 100 years ago had absolutely NO idea how long the image would last. They were just using the latest materials and processes available at the time.

Inkjet printing is merely carrying on the tradition of photographers making images using a technology with unproven anecdotal longevity.

Many of the supposed examples of art media longevity given in this thread can also be proven false. Watercolors - Turner. Oils - VanGogh. Both artists' works have faded appreciably. Turner's work is in such bad condition that it is rarely allowed to be viewed by anyone short of curators and art historians who may look at it only under subdued light for brief periods of time. The background on VanGogh's "Lillies" has faded from a soft pink to white.

Ink printing has been around for a lot longer than photography. There are ink printed images around that are nearly 1,000 years old (Japanese, and Chinese). Western art has ink printed images that are at least 500 years old, and multi-color ink prints that are 200 years old.

The fact that someone has made an inkjet print that has faded in 1-2 years is less a commentary on the process than the person's familiarity with the technology and proficiency with the process.

I have more confidence in color inkjet print longevity than photographic color paper longevity. But, I've invested the time in learning the inkjet process (and printing in general), investigated materials, and have developed a materials suite and workflow that will give the best longevity with the currently available materials.

[Michael Gordon]

Going off of Adrian Tyler and Joe Lipka: I don't have a lot of faith that humans will last longer than my inkjet prints, and it would be pretty egotistical of me to think that 100 years from now any number of persons would be interested in seeing my 100 year old photographs. We all may like to think that we'll reach the importance of Adams or Weston or (insert shoice here), but few us of will.

[Scott Davis]

Going off of Adrian Tyler and Joe Lipka: I don't have a lot of faith that humans will last longer than my inkjet prints, and it would be pretty egotistical of me to think that 100 years from now any number of persons would be interested in seeing my 100 year old photographs. We all may like to think that we'll reach the importance of Adams or Weston or (insert shoice here), but few us of will.

Well, as to the long-term viability of ones work from an artistic standpoint, if you lack the chutzpah to expect it and demand it, you will almost guarantee your work to be consigned to the great dustbin of obscurity. As to the longevity of the materials you use to create your work, well... David Hockney once painted a painting using ordinary housepaint, and sold it to one of the big London galleries. The painting started to flake off the canvas after 20 years. He's now paying a 10 million pound judgement to the museum for their loss. His reputation has also taken a hit because of it.

[steve_782]

Well, as to the long-term viability of ones work from an artistic standpoint, if you lack the chutzpah to expect it and demand it, you will almost guarantee your work to be consigned to the great dustbin of obscurity. As to the longevity of the materials you use to create your work, well... David Hockney once painted a painting using ordinary housepaint, and sold it to one of the big London galleries. The painting started to flake off the canvas after 20 years. He's now paying a 10 million pound judgement to the museum for their loss. His reputation has also taken a hit because of it.

I fail to see the point. This has less to do with materials and more to do with Hockney's lack of a good contract. I guess VanGogh and Turner's reputations are taking a "hit" also. Turner is famous for telling the manufacturer of the paints he used that he was only responsible for the art, and not the materials. The materials were the responsibility of the manufacturer.

I guess you'd better start piling on Turner for having a "bad attitude."

Hockney's real problem was not the paint materials but the combination of house paint on canvas. House paints are made to be applied to solid substrates and not canvas. There is no reason that a high quality house paint should not last as long as artist's materials if the combination is correct.

While you're piling on, you'd better add Leonardo DaVinci into the hit as his fresco of "The Last Supper" is a total wreck because of his poor choice of materials and piss poor fresco technique.

Pot shots are easy - anyone can pick a famous target as an example.

[tim atherton]

David Hockney once painted a painting using ordinary housepaint, and sold it to one of the big London galleries. The painting started to flake off the canvas after 20 years. He's now paying a 10 million pound judgement to the museum for their loss. His reputation has also taken a hit because of it.

Have you got the reference to that? It would be an interesting read for our conservator.

Mind you, looking at the auctions, I don't think it's had much effect on his reputation.... his work is going for record prices

[John Kasaian]

Photographs only need to last for as long as they serve a purpose. If the purpose is to inform the folks in 2525 AD about Starbucks (or what Half Dome looked like in 2006,) then yes, they should last 520 years.

It would have been pretty cool to see photographs from 520 year ago, but we have to settle for paintings and sculpture, which come to think of it might not be too bad a thing.

Unfortunately there aren't many celebrated artists making paintings or sculptures that look like anything reality these days. Maybe our photographs will be all that our children's children's children's children's children's children will have to go by.

Thats a rather sobering thought, isn't it?

I wonder if Polygnotos ever considered that his art would have lasted as long as it does and the importance of what it reveals to us today?

Cheers!

[Ed K.]

It's not so much that one taking the photograph will know for sure how valuable the photograph will be in the future. Many great photographs of the past are of everyday life, very representational, and probably not something that would win the photo show. Instead, humble records, dutifully recording the conditions of the time; living up to the phrase "a picture is worth a thousand words".

In times past, those photographer's DID care about their photographs lasting. Thus, the Woodburytype, carbon prints, platinum prints, etc. They sought to make photographs that would not fade, and of course some things didn't work out.

If we want to, we have choices to do better, choices to value durable things that are well made and well researched. Instead, we give up our choices to things analogous to disposable razors with 5 blades. Shick was a broke, desperate inventor - one day he thought of how great it would be to have something that required purchasing a disposable thing over and over again, a trade of convenience. Sure it had benefits. Today, we've got the 5 bladed things with batteries in them no less, and frankly, I'd rather use the double-edged one for a better shave ( okay, Shick's first, right? ). But the handle is still good, well made, functional, needs no batteries, and is bio-degradable AND can be recycled. Hmmm, okay, that's another argument - durability.

Back to the original part - be it ever so humble, a photograph can be a window into another world, and something worth making well.

On the other hand, many professional photographers I have chatted with on this issue remark that "if it needs a new print in a year - great! more money!" - and because the photos are advertising photos for public display, it's just more money and more work, a living. Afterall, professional does mean "doing it for a living". Seems to me that doing it for a living and doing it well have a place though.

You all have contributed so many thoughful ideas and points of view - a lot to think about, and example of how there can be many "right answers" to a problem depending upon the context.

[Hugo Zhang]

Ed wrote:

"There is the question of how long is long enough. For me, I hope that some images make it 200-300 years. Long enough for someone to have a moment musing over those funny things we did, or how we dressed, or even how many fingers we had or the odd shape of our non-optimized heads."

I will be only interested in this question if I were a documentary photographer. As an artist using black and white images to create my own world, I would pay more attention to "how" instead of "what". An extreme example, Paul Cezanne spent the last 25 years of his life painting Mt. Saint-Victoire. Every morning he would walked out of his house to the foot of that mountain and painted till it was dark. He cut his ties to the world and got ridiculed by people around him. He stubbornly painted it more than 60 times. Today people are paying hundreds of millions for his paintings not just to see that mountain. Mt. Saint-Victoire is still there as it was 150 years ago.

Paulr..

"Most things in this world change, discolor, fade. Look in the mirror: you're not archival, and neither am I. Nor are the people we sell the work to. It's really a silly obsession, unless your work is actually made for archival purposes.

None of those Rennaissance oil paintings you've seen in museums look anything like what they did when they were new. But they're still here, and they still work their magic on us. Permanent, no ... beautiful, yes."

And William...

"Agreed, and this somewhat points to an odd predicament within the human condition. For want of immortality, we want to leave something of ourselves behind. Be it an artistic legacy, a statement, a moment of simple passing pleasure for someone else, we want to be remembered. A medium that promises to be a vessel to carry a man's passion, then sinks before making it out of the harbor, holds itself out for an especially passionate condemnation."


I have to use a beatiful line from Nabokov: "Our life is just a crack of light between two eternities of darkness." We are born, live and die like a puff of smoke. We pass our life through our genes to our children and grandchildren, the way plants and animals do. We will live for months or years if lucky in the memories of those close to us. Then we have no traces left. That's why art functions as our endeavor for immortality. Shakesapeare is still alive in his plays. Homer lives in his Iliad. We feel Cezanne in his paintings. We see Flaubert whenever we open his book Madam Bovary. Even poor H.H. asked to live for a few more months so that he could finish his book to make Lolita live for generations. He got his wish. We have to say certain words and images do have longer life than others.

John wrote...

"It is of no relevance to me. I shoot LF for my personal pleasure. The chance observe the world, and wait for that instant, when it presents something that moves me. I am still under the illusion that I can capture the emotion. I am able to make a pretty good reference to help me remember the event though. Others can look at it and say that's beautiful, and I'm thinking yea, you should have been there. After the looking, shooting, souping, and printing, if it was like mission impossible, and this print will self destruct in 10 seconds. I would still do it the same. It's the process, not the result or how long it last, that drives me to haul 50# of 8x10 around."

Well said, John. This reminds me of a life changing experience a few years ago. I went to an art center to see a Sand Mandala performed a group of Tibetan monks. Millions of grains of brightcolored sand are painstakingly laid into place on a square table over several days by eight monks to create the most beautiful, most exquisite color sand sculpture. Shortly after its completion, it was destroyed. I can still see vividly the joyful expressions on their faces today. They use this to teach us the impermanence of life.

In the end, it is the style rather than content that has a longer life. True artist with his unique style always brings us a brand new world. I believe AA's silver prints will outlive many pt/pd prints I see today.

[paulr]

Based on some of these views, the ultimate offense might be selling art made with water-soluble food coloring, painted onto acidic, pulp-based cardboard. Like, for instance, using M&Ms to paint on the back of recycled postcards, and selling at a gallery for hundreds of dollars.

Surely such an artist should be thrown in jail!

But what if he's already in jail? Extend his sentence? But then what if he's already serving three life sentences, all in solitary confinement???

Does violating the Archival Commandments justify the death penalty?

Discuss ....

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/07/21/us...rtner=homepage