RIP - The Contact Printers Guild

[Daniel Grenier]

I was very surprised today when I went to see what was new at The Contact Printers Guild only to find out they had ceased operations this past September. Even more surprising is the fact that this was never mentioned on this site (that I've noticed) considering three or four members of the Guild are/were active on this Forum.

I don't know the details but I'm sorry to see this venture has failed. OTOH, "Ray Bidegain, Gerhard Bock and Patrick Kolb are in the process of setting up another venture which will be announced soon" as posted on the Guild's website.

[Hector.Navarro]

it's a sad surprise, I thought it was a pretty interesting take on the "selling prints" business.

[D. Bryant]

it's a sad surprise, I thought it was a pretty interesting take on the "selling prints" business.

Looks like they have trimmed their staff and have started a new organization:

http://www.thephotocontinuum.com/

Don Bryant

[Greg Y]

I had a look at the website and then linked to one of the photographer's websites....("pigment ink on archival papers")......unfortunately makes it a far cry from the Contact Printer's Guild. Thankfully , the photographers from the CPG like Ray Bidegain etc are still around working in the traditional way.

[D. Bryant]

I had a look at the website and then linked to one of the photographer's websites....("pigment ink on archival papers")......unfortunately makes it a far cry from the Contact Printer's Guild. Thankfully , the photographers from the CPG like Ray Bidegain etc are still around working in the traditional way.

I've seen Ray's work and several of the other Contact Printers guild member such as Susan Huber and Sandy King just to name those. They do excellent work but I don't take issue with ink jet printing.

I personally do both and they are just different forms of printing making; neither of which are worth a shit if the photography behind the process doesn't carry the load.


Don Bryant

[Greg Y]

Don, I agree, there are lots of processes & alt processes......my thought though, is that the Contact Printers Guild filled a unique niche.....(big negatives and contact printing).....so to look at the photo continuum site and see a leica photo & injet printing....means that de-facto they aren't doing the thing that made the CPG unique.
Each of us has our accepted printing mediums....fair enough.

[IanG]

I remember an exchange of views with Jorge Gastreano a few years ago about the dumbing down of the CPG. One problem with groups like this is poor work from a small number lets the whole group down and that was happening.

Ian

[IanG]

Didn't they jury the work before allowing it to be shown or sold?

It didn't appear that way at the time, there was some extremely poor work offered for sale, by a just one or two photographers though. I have bought an image sold through the site (privately though) and I do collect photography.

Any collective is always let down by it's weak links, and in this case there were truly awful.

Unfortunately the images are lost when accessing via the Internet Archive or you could see for your selves.

Ian

[Ray Bidegain]

I had a look at the website and then linked to one of the photographer's websites....("pigment ink on archival papers")......unfortunately makes it a far cry from the Contact Printer's Guild. Thankfully , the photographers from the CPG like Ray Bidegain etc are still around working in the traditional way.

Greg: I want to say thank you for noticing my work and the kind words. I still have strong feelings about the role of hand made photographs, and will continue to make them for as long as I am able. It seems to me these days that only a small percentage of the photographs made ever find themselves being viewed as a fine print, much less a hand made one. Seems sad to me for the sake of our medium.

Best,

Ray Bidegain

[Michael Kadillak]

It didn't appear that way at the time, there was some extremely poor work offered for sale, by a just one or two photographers though. I have bought an image sold through the site (privately though) and I do collect photography.

Any collective is always let down by it's weak links, and in this case there were truly awful.

Unfortunately the images are lost when accessing via the Internet Archive or you could see for your selves.

Ian

I agree that initially there was some great work being shown and then a number of new people came on board with very substandard images and it went to hell in a hand basket. Don't know exactly what happened administratively but they had a fabulous idea but got diluted to the point where it lost its credibility and it was their own fault.