Re: great alt process exhibit in St louis

I had the good fortune to see the show and must comment that there is no
comparison between the actual prints and the reproductions in the book. They
are admirable reproductions. I am not criticizing the book. But, seeing the
show made me aware how badly the historical prints reproduce. I was struck
by the lively nature of the prints on very textured paper for instance that
when put through the photomechanical screen came out looking more like
speckles. The sort of graininess that gum is often accused of having. But
the originals were not like that. The texture was related to the paper and
much softer than the screened images. It was also very informative to me to
see the scale of things. The Demachy prints are all small contacts from the
camera images. The German work was often huge and printed on heavily
textured watercolor paper. There were several prints on laid paper with its
strong banding texture. I had never realized the extent that the
pictorialists worked to suppress detail. Soft focus of course but also print
manipulation. There are examples in the show of original silver prints from
negatives that were then printed in gum or oil where very detailed passages
with rich texture were smeared into simpler flatter planes to construct what
the photographer must have thought was a more "artistic", more "painterly"
effect.

The extent of reworking images extended into even the fresson and
photogravure prints. Sometimes by manipulation of the negative through
scraping or drawing on it. Sometimes by scraping or drypoint on the copper
plates. The gum on page 42 by Puro clearly had the foliage of the foreground
tree if not the entire tree painted in. There were several examples of this
use of a dense black having been painted in to form a silhouetted foreground
for dramatic compositional effect. Interestingly the tag on the print that
appears on the cover of the book -Trinks "Colored Shadows"- commented that
the shadows had been added to the image. I would say that they were
manipulated by brushing in development but not added. Just because this is
pictorialism and the shadows are dramatic does not prove they were faked.

I can't say enough about the value for me to have seen this show. If you
can, go.

Jack

> From: Keith Gerling <Keith@GumPhoto.com>
> Reply-To: alt-photo-process-l@usask.ca
> Date: Thu, 27 Apr 2006 08:58:58 -0700
> To: alt-photo-process-l@usask.ca
> Subject: RE: great alt process exhibit in St louis
>
> It is quite an impressive book. Unfortunately many of my favorite pieces in
> the show are not in the book as the Rennes and St. Louis showings differed
> more than slightly in content. There was a particularly impressive large
> dark gum of a factory spewing smoke at twilight that I don't think made the
> book. A shame, because one doesn't usually think of industrial landscapes
> when one hears the phrase "pictorial photography". As you are looking
> through the book, be sure to check out the dimensions of the works. Some of
> those gum prints were surprisingly HUGE - something not easily conveyed in a
> book.
>
> Two observations concerning this show: 1. The museum was loaning out large
> magnifying glasses for this show, encouraging the users to get really close
> and intimate with the works. I thought that was nice. 2. The first time I
> attended I spent some time eavesdropping on the conversation that a museum
> official was having with a couple of his friends. Apparently he has
> something to do with hanging the show, because he discussed at length some
> of the hassles he had encountered in obtaining works from European sources.
> His fascinated guests were surprised to learn that people actually still
> made gum prints but as he explained, it isn't easy, because it is hard to
> find the "mineral paper" that is required for gum printing. Mineral paper?
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Christina Z. Anderson [mailto:zphoto@montana.net]
> Sent: Thursday, April 27, 2006 6:09 AM
> To: alt-photo-process-l@usask.ca
> Subject: Re: great alt process exhibit in St louis
>
>
> Yes there is and I bought it and it is worth every penny! I would say it is
> the most applicable show catalog to this list I have seen in years.
> Available on Amazon.com or directly from the museum. It has a great
> biography section in the back, and full color prints, and tops Antiquarian
> Avant-Garde as a must-have alt book. It comes as close to being at the
> exhibit as you can be, even to the point of seeing paper texture in the
> reproductions.
> Chris
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Greg Schmitz" <gws1@columbia.edu>
> To: <alt-photo-process-l@usask.ca>
> Sent: Thursday, April 27, 2006 6:21 AM
> Subject: Re: great alt process exhibit in St louis
>
>
>>
>> Thom,
>>
>> I don't think I'll get out of Alaska in time to see the show. Did you
>> happen to notice if there was a publication that went along with the
>> exhibit? If there was, is it worth buying?
>>
>> Thanks -greg
>>
>>
>> On Thu, 27 Apr 2006, Thom Mitchell wrote:
>>
>>> Hello all, not sure if this is well known or not but , I was in St louis
>>> for business and played a little hooky by going to the Art Museum. There
>>> is an exhibit is titled: Impressionist Camera: Pictorial Photography in
>>> Europe, 1888-1918. There are really wonderful prints and autochromes, not
>>> to mention carbons, gums, platinums, Fressons, gravures and even a silver
>>> gelatin.
>>
>> ===rest deleted: snip%<
>>
>
>
>
>
Received on Thu Apr 27 09:58:03 2006