Re: The "best" paper for gum (Was:Paper for gum prints in Europe

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From: Katharine Thayer (kthayer@pacifier.com)
Date: 06/13/01-03:34:01 AM Z


Hi, Iva (Brahma)?
If I'm not mistaken, Lanaquarelle is made in France, so one wouldn't
think it would be hard to find in Europe.

I'm glad you found a paper you like, but my tests have not shown
Lanaquarelle particularly more wonderful than other papers for gum. It's
fine, but doesn't stand out as "by far the best." There are a number of
papers that can print gum equally nicely. Like you, I wouldn't put BFK
Rives in that category, but some expert gum printers favor that paper,
and I'm not going to argue with them. We all print a little differently,
and we're all after something different in the look of the final
print.

I once printed a small picture of a woman's head on about 35 sample
papers from Daniel Smith's sample packets of watercolor paper and
printmaking paper, to demonstrate how differently different paper
textures render detail. I didn't have enough of each paper to do test
prints and find an optimum exposure for each of them, so I just used my
"standard" exposure and pigment mix. So of course the paper I use came
out looking the "best" in this whole pile of papers (perfectly exposed,
highlights clear, shadows detailed) because my exposure and pigment mix
were optimized for this paper. But that does not mean that my paper is
"the best." If I had optimized the variables for a different paper,
then that paper would come out printing the picture "best" and mine
wouldn't have come out so well. My point being that determining the
"best" paper for gum is an exercise in futility.
Katharine Thayer

lva wrote:
>
> Hello fellow gummists,
>
> I have recently tried several papers (including BFK Rives in both
> grammages) for gum bichromate prints, and, just as Livick writes,
> Lanaquarelle is by far the best.
>
> Does anyone know where in Europe one can get Lanaquarelle?
>
> Greetings
>
> Brahma


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