[alt-photo] Re: "Alternative Printing": Terms to define

[etienne garbaux]

Earl and Patty wrote:

>To get back to the original thought, is it only the print that 
>categorizes it as 'alternative' or 'alt-process'? That seems to be 
>what I am hearing from most of these posts. While this is a useful 
>limitation of the scope of an imprecise term, it leaves out some of 
>the work that has long been included in the alt-process category. 
>Pinhole photographers and wet-plate practitioners (I'm sure there 
>are others) whose prints do not fit the definition might object to 
>being left out.

Most wet-plate images would still qualify even if the term were 
limited to the printing process (which is not to say that I think it 
should be so limited), because wet-plate practitioners generally 
print on hand-made collodion, albumen, or salted paper.  I suppose 
there are folks who print wet plate negatives on SG paper, or even 
scan them and make inkjet prints, but I'm not aware of any.

OTOH, unlike some, I see no reason why the imaging process itself is 
not a legitimate photographic "process" -- in my view, "process" does 
not necessarily imply "chemical process" or "printmaking 
process."  So, I'm inclined to consider pinhole, as well as 
ultraviolet and infrared imaging, to be "alternative" 
processes.  This can get arbitrary very quickly, though -- I would 
not consider using lensbabies or cameras with funky plastic lenses to 
be alternative, and IR is quickly becoming relatively mainstream.

At the other end of the spectrum, there are works that are so highly 
hand-doctored that, while they are clearly "alternative," so little 
of the "process" of their creation is photographic that I cannot 
regard them as "photographs" and would, therefore, deny to them the 
appellation "alternative process photography."

Best regards,

etienne