Re: Gum Printing/Observations

katharine thayer (kthayer@pacifier.com)
Sat, 20 Jun 1998 22:19:18 +0000

Thanks for your kind words.

You asked what kind of gum arabic I use, and what brand lamp black.
I use premixed gum that I bought from...Photographer's Formulary, I
think. Or Daniel Smith. And I'm not sure what lamp black I'm using, to
tell you the truth. Maybe Grumbacher. It came with a kit I bought a long
time ago. I don't use black except on monochrome prints, which I make
fewer of than full color prints, so I don't mix up black very often. I
was intrigued by your (I think that was you) mention of black gouache in
the 1996 archives, and may try that sometime, if you're still advocating
that. Isn't it pretty opaque? But then, so is lamp black when it comes
to that.

About the pigment test— some people have already written me about that
test, so I'm willing to concede that I may very well have got lucky,
because it was the one and only time I ever used that test.

When I said don't beat up on me, I didn't mean about my thoughts about
gum printing; I took it on faith that you wouldn't beat up on me about
that. But thanks for your encouragement anyway. What I was worried about
was the act of sending the post, getting it to the right address safe
and sound without crashing the system or something. I'm not a
computerphobe by any means, but for some reason I've waited til now to
try the internet and it's all new and strange to me.

Thanks for the conversation; I've enjoyed it!

Katharine Thayer