Re: The future of the handmade print?

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From: Richard Sullivan (richsul@earthlink.net)
Date: 03/09/02-01:57:36 PM Z


Sandy,

What you say is logical and rational. The only problem is that art is neither.

The issue of "authenticity" rears its ugly head. One could logically say it
matters not one wit whether a painting in the Met was actually painted by
Rembrandt or "looked just like one," but the dust bins of museums are full
of "looks just like ones." Artists are universal heros and in fact more
people in the US visit museums than attend sports events! Surveys have
shown that more people can name 10 great artists than can name 10 great
sports heroes. There is a collected connectedness to the past when one
stand before a Rembrandt that one does not feel when standing before a
"Rembrandt wannabee"

The issue of multiples adds another dimension to the authenticity debate.
Limiting the number of multiples is thought to increase their authenticity
and the market tends to bear this out. I have written on the issue of
limited editions before and won't go into it now:
http://www.bostick-sullivan.com/musings.htm

If image quality were the issue then one could run thousands of high
quality reproduction off a good quad tone offset press. Behind a frame on a
wall it is very difficult and impossible in many cases to tell a high
quality offset reproduction from an original alt print. Most photographers
would quickly correct anyone looking at their work and saying "Oh that's a
reproduction!"

"Hell no, that's an original Sullivan!"

But if it is one of 100,000 is it an "original Sullivan?"

I contend something has craft value as well as art value. A good Karistan
broadloom rug is as good as any "Persian" hand tied carpet. One takes a
family a year to make and the other spins off a mechanical loom is minutes.
One is worth 10 times the other. One is a naturally "limited edition." One
is an authentic hand made rug. Guess which one.

Carbon, gum, bromoil, etc are in some sense "naturally limited" editions.
Morris and the Pictorialsts raged against the mass production coming to
fore at that time and I think they had their finger on the reason, and that
there was a natural limitation to mass production via the handmade route
and thus there was more authenticity to their work.

The fact is that from my perspective most young emerging photographers
"limit" their editions. I think it is wrong to do so but it is clear the
inspiration to do so is market driven. If the motivation was to allow as
many people to enjoy the images as possible then we should hold the button
down and let thousands pop out.

"Ah, but some would say," your just arguing from a market point of view."
True! And in my four years as a gallery director I found very few who would
forsake the career and income of becoming a noted fine arts photographer.
When I'd gently point out flaws in presentation I'd often get "But that has
nothing to do with art!" type comments, "I just want to do art." Well, I'd
say in as gentle terms as I could, "Then go away and do art, why are you
here?" Often just stunned silence.

It is also from my perspective that most alt photographers desire the
natural limitation that the process imposes and feel that the work acquires
more authenticity because of it.

Gut spilled.

--Dick Sullivan

Cross posted to

http://sirius.secureforum.com:8080/~bostick/login

>The idea you express are virtually identical to the aesthetic ideology
>espoused by the Pictorialists over a century ago, specifically, only
>photographs that show hand work or intervention by the photographers could
>be considered works of art. That idea, then as now, is too narrowly
>construed. So too was the opposing modernist view that photographs should
>only be made on glossy silver gelatin papers.
>
>One of the most outstanding photographers of the pictorial school in
>Spain, Migue Goicochea (died Pamplona in 1983) made in 1928 a statement
>about processes that I consider to be equally valid today. My translation
>of the original statement that appeared in Spanish in the magazine Foto
>follows.
>
>"Let's talk about processes. I am convinced that they all have the
>potential to produce art. If Robert Demachy were to read this he might be
>incensed, since he was of the opinion that only the pigment processes are
>capable of giving artistic results, and indeed, only a few of these. But
>we should not be so intransigent in this matter. Exclusiveness blinds us
>and prevents a proper appreciation of many worthy things."
>
>Regards,
>
>Sandy King
>
>
>
>
>--


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