Freeform gum

[Katharine Thayer <kthayer@pacifier.com>]

On Sep 17, 2007, at 1:10 PM, Bruce Campbell wrote:

> Katharine and others on the Alt Photo List
>
> Per our recent discussions regarding "freeform" gum prints, your e  
> mail comment---- quote ---"But that's the cool thing about gum  
> printing, is that like painters, we can think about these questions  
> of how colors work together, and like painters, we could even  
> choose colors that work together in ways that suit our purpose,  
> rather than represent the actual colors if  they don't"  and your  
> other e mail comment ----quote "in gum printing we have the option  
> to express an image in whatever colors we want to use (more like a  
> painter than a
> photographer"  )   sounds to me that this print may be an example  
> of a "freeform" gum print.
Bruce, I'd like to separate this  topic if I may from the discussion  
about  Charles's print, since my remark quoted above wasn't intended  
to refer to Charles's print particularly  but was a general and  
peripheral remark that spun off from comments I was making about his  
print.

But yes,  after thinking about it, I am willing to consider that my  
earlier definition of  "freeform gum"  (as a gum print made with one  
negative and more than one color, separating the colors either by  
selective application of the color on different areas of the print,  
or by using different colors for the shadows and highlights and  
separating them by exposure, or by selective removal of color during  
development) may have been too narrow, probably narrower than the  
understanding many people have of the term.

I understand that for many people,  "freeform gum" means any gum  
print that has more than one color that is not strictly a "tricolor"  
or "four color" gum print, in the sense that color separations are  
used and process-like colors are chosen to reproduce the original  
colors in the scene as accurately as possible.  By this description,  
at least 99% of gum prints would have to be considered "freeform" I  
think, since very few if any of us take up gum printing as a way to  
achieve accurate color reproductions.    By this definition, a color  
print that's made with color separations but with arbitrarily chosen  
pigments to produce a creatively chosen color palette, as I've  
described in the quoted passage above, could well be called a  
freeform gum.  Since my earlier definition seems to have been  
idiosyncratic, although it still makes sense to me,  I'll broaden my  
understanding of the term as described.  Thanks,
Katharine