RE: POP process

On Mon, 8 Nov 2004, Gerry Giliberti wrote:
> ....I read a great
> article in a back issue of Post Factory Photography (#6?) about an artist
> who has really great images on POP and a special way of toning that results
> in a rose colored tone---but I don't have the info here at work. I'll look
> for it at home.

The article that comes to mind was in Post-Factory #9, John Yang and John
Dugdale... two of my favorite photographers in the world even if they
weren't so charming. The occasion was Dugdale having seen Yang's exquisite
toned POP landscapes and, preparing to do a show of his own in POP,
wanting some advice... I tagged along because I'd seen Yang's POP
"Sepulchral Portraits," the century-old enamel grave photographs found at
Mount Zion cemetery in Queens, New York... To quote the announcement for
that show:

"Yang's interest includes the subjects in the portraits, and also,
especially, the very process of change itself -- the effects of time
passing, etched in the faces. He has recorded these portraits precisely as
they are now -- some perfectly preserved, others streaked, crumbling, in
varying degrees of erosion. Often, almost nothing at all of the original
photograph remains, just the handiwork of the retoucher. In others, faces
and expressions can be clearly read: young and old, handsome and plain,
aristocratic and laboring classes, men, women and children." Etc. etc.

The prints (on POP) were toned either bluish or pinkish, by varying
temperature and mixes of the gold toner. Dugdale was in love with the pink
tones (as was I) and the discussion, though it ranged through the entire
spectrum, so to speak, circled around that. Yang said in any given batch
he gets a range of tones, though "for warmer tones, before they're bone
dry, put the prints between blotters in a hot press....The temperature of
the wash water also makes a difference...Above 68 (F) warms it up, but
also tends to leach out color." He also found that sodium carbonate rather
than borax in the toner and long slow exposure favored the warm tones. (He
uses the Chicago Albumen Works alkali gold toner formula.) In the event,
Dugdale got nice warm tones in his POP, so the technique apparently
travels.

Judy
Received on Mon Nov 8 23:35:48 2004