Who put the Glaze on Weston's Pepper?

robert hudyma (rhudyma@idirect.com)
Tue, 19 Mar 1996 10:22:45 -0500

I was fortunate to have enough time to visit the Museum of
Modern Art in San Francisco last week. They have an excellent
exhibit that features a number of Edward Weston's prints.

I noticed that there was a shiny metalic silver colored deposit
on the surface of Weston's "Pepper #38" in the areas of the
print having the deepest blacks.

The print is a silver-gelatin with deep rich warm black tones. The
deposit was very thin, on the surface of the print, and only in
the deepest black areas. I don't know if the print was toned or not
(probably not). You need to look at the print on an angle to notice
it clearly.

I've noticed this same effect on some (but not all) silver prints
that I bought that were made in the 1920's as well. I'm also
assuming that they didn't look that way when they were originally
printed but I wasn't around then so I don't know for sure.

Some questions:

Is this caused by a reaction with pollutants in the atmosphere
or by some other mechanism?

Given enough time will this affect the entire print?

Are current silverprinting materials prone to this effect as well?

Is this deposit metalic Silver or something else?


Robert Hudyma Email: rhudyma@idirect.com
Semi-Tech Corporation, 131 McNabb St., Markham Ontario, CANADA L3R 5V7