Re: Kallitype Permanence (was Real People)

Date view Thread view Subject view Author view

From: Sandy King (sanking@hubcap.clemson.edu)
Date: 03/12/01-09:38:21 AM Z


Joe Portale wrote:

>The problem of permenance with kallitype may in fact be a non-issue. There
>are many reasons, historic, urban myth and just plain bad PR why kalli's
>were concidered to be less than permanent. The earliest kallies were in
>fact pretty transitory. The use of a sodium thiosulfate fixer was not a
>common practice. Herschell and Talbot, in their early work, both used
>common table salt as a fixer. Also, the first generation kalitypes were
>compounded with the impure brown ferric ammonium citrate. The later
>versions and today, use the more pure green FAO. This lack of chemical
>purity with the AFO would be a root cause of early image failure.

I think the problem is not a non-issue for a lot of people because the
prevailing opinion is that kallitypes are *not* very permanent. If that is
not the case a sharing of opinions about what constitutes the best
processing for permanency would really be in order.
>

>As with Callie, I have Van Dykes that have been siting in a frame on my wall
>(in various houses) for well over ten years. They look as good as the day
>they were made. I forgot who did this, but a kallitype was actually
>attached to the inside window of a car. This person drove around with the
>print in the back window for two years without showing any sign of
>degrading. If my memory serves me, this person lives in a very sunny
>climate where the effects of the sun would be very apparant.

Yes, I remember the story, and the person was from Portugal. Carlos *&^^&???
>
>Dick Sullivan stated that he believes that one of the reasons that
>kallitypes are considered not permanent is the lack of examples in museums
>and galleries. People being people, if the untrained eye could not tell the
>difference, what prevented a nineteenth century photographer from selling a
>platinum print and delivering a kallitype?

I rather doubt that there are a lot of vintage kallitypes out there
masquerading as platinums, but on the other hand platinum toned kallitypes
can have all of the same visual refernces as real platinum prints.

>What is
>the single most common mistake amatures make when printing pictures? In my
>experience is lack of proper fixing and washing.

There also appears to be some question about length of development as a
contributory factor to permanence. And of course clearing.
>

>Debate?

What concerns me more than anything else is the amount of contradictory
information one finds in the literature. One expert says develop for a
minimum period of time, another says you need to develop for 6-10 minutes.
One says clear for 2 minutes, another recommends 10-15 minutes. It would
really be useful for experts like yourself and Callie Type to clarify some
of the issues inherent in these contradictory recommendations.

Regards,

Sandy King


Date view Thread view Subject view Author view

This archive was generated by hypermail 2b30 : 04/02/01-09:55:25 AM Z CST