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Alternative Processes Revisited - Judith Ahearn

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Alternative Processes Revisited - Judith Ahearn Alternative Processes Revisited - Judith Ahearn In this paper I will investigate aspects of these early processes and their history, focusing on the Platinum/Palladium process for longer exploration. I will examine the work of contemporary art photographers who are working in these areas. I will explore some of the conceptual framework and practical considerations that need to be considered by artists who wish to investigate and work in these processes. Digital imaging today permeates our daily experience. From graphic images on bank machines, digitally processed commercials, virtual reality to scientific images and visual databases, the effects of computerized images is changing the way culture perceived itself and records and values its information. The computer is increasingly used as a creative tool, forging into realms merging graphics, text, video, sound and photography. The transformation of imaging made possible with the use of the computer has challenged assumptions about the veracity of photographs. Within the area of fine art though there has been a steady and continued interest in nineteenth century hand applied non-silver processes. Processes that may in the commercial sense be regarded as "obsolete" such as photogravure, cyanotype and platinum are being employed by artists taking advantage of the variety of surfaces and effects available and for the longevity of the print and its unique characteristics. Historical Background to these Processes The early development and invention of photography involved numerous investigations into the light sensitivity and stability of chemical compounds. Joseph Niepce's heliograph of 'Window at Le Gras', 1827, widely accepted as the first of many 'photographic' images, was produced through coating a metal plate with bitumen of Judea. In 1829 Niepce and Daguerre entered into a partnership. In 1839 Dageurre announced his first demonstration to the Academy of Sciences. A Copper sheet was plated with silver and exposed to iodine vapors, which produced light sensitive emulsion, silver iodine. The plate was exposed in a portable camera obscura, then developed by exposure to mercury vapors and fixed in a bath of hyposulphite of soda. In 1833 William Henry Fox Talbot conceived of a method of making permanent photographic images. He devised a light sensitive emulsion by making coating s of sodium chloride and silver nitrate on paper. Talbot placed objects in contact with the sensitized printing paper and exposed it to the sun to produce what he called photogenic drawings. In 1835 he produced his first successful image using a negative system capable of producing endless duplicates. Daguerres' successful daguerreotype process and Fox Talbot's calotype, initiated the investigation of other possibilities for creating light sensitive systems that could permanently affix an image to a surface. Discovered by Sir John Herschel in 1842, cyanotype was one of the first nonsilver processes used to create photographic image. It was adopted as a copying technique used to reproduce mechanical and architectural drawings. Cyanopte remains one of the least expensive and most effective processes for printing photographic images, permitting a great variety in both mood and color. In this process, paper is sensitized with ferric ammonium citrate and potassium ferricyanide. Exposure to light reduces a portion of the ferric salt to the ferrous state, and a portion of the ferricyanide to ferrocyanide, resulting in the formation of a pale, blue white image of ferrous ferrocyanide. After exposure, the Cyanotype is washed in water, removing the unreduced salts, leaving ferrous ferrocyanide behind. On drying, the ferrous ferrocyanide oxidizes to a deep blue tone. Except for a tendency to slightly fade, Cyantope images are permanent. The first experiments with platinum took place in 1830 when Ferdinand Gehlen discovered that a solution of platinum chloride formed a precipitate of metallic Platinum when exposed to light. Experiments by Johann Dobereiner combined ferric oxalate with platinum chloride to form the precipitated of platinum metal, this becoming the basis of the platinotype process. A workable platinum printing process could not be developed at that time and other printing methods such as albumen printing paper, salted paper prints and later gelatin silver were developed commercially. In the 1870's methods were developed to make light sensitive platinum emulsions using ferric salts. In 1873 the first patent for a platinoytpe process was granted to William Willis. Platinum developed to become the most popular printing medium in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. Platinum became one of the primary printing media in the Fine Art Photography and Pictorialist movements, favoured by members of the 'linked Ring' in Britain, the Photo Secession in Vienna and the 'Photo-Secession in the U.S. Emerson and Steiglitz declared gravure and platinum to be the only two processes suitable for "artistic photography". The platinotype was favoured by proponents of 'straight' or unmanipulated photography while advocates of extensive hand manipulation of photographic images began to favour the gum bichromate process. Silver papers were perceived as appropriate mainly for commercial and professional purposes rather than photography as artistic expression. Emerson believed that photography was a full equivalent of the traditional fine arts. His work bears strong resemblance to the work of naturalistic painters such as Millet. Emerson favored platinum over the silver gelatin process, feeling that the platinum allowed truer tonalities. He complained that the blacks of gelatin silver were too black, forcing the photographer to lower all the tones in the photograph to keep them in balance. In the late 1800's the Pictorialist photographers sought in their work to consciously imitate the subjects and compositions of paintings. These artists believed photographs should be regarded as pictures in the same sense as images judged by hand, and should be viewed for their artistry and ability to evoke feeling rather than purely the power of description. These aesthetic photographers held that photographs should be concerned with beauty rather than fact, regarding optical sharpness and the exact replicative aspects of photography as limitations. Rejecting the sharpness of conventional photographic images, these art photographers embraced the manipulation of the print as the emblem of self-expression. The individuality of artistic expression was explored through the production of a unique print, the artist controlling detail and tone through manipulation of the surface and the printing of the image on art papers. The pictorialist artists used non silver subjects i.e. bichromate gelatin and carbon, finding they could control tonalities, introduce highlights and obscure detail using pencils, brush, etching tools to alter forms in soft gum, oil and pigments. Softening procedures included platinum and gum printing, reproduction by the photogravure process and drawing directly on the negative. With many of these processes the final image results from a contact print necessitating the use of large negatives, increasing the medium's ability to render fine detail. The use of carbon and platinum coated papers produced deep luminous tonalities and a long scale of tonal values. No positive print emerged as an exact version of the negative, or identical duplicate of itself. Clarence White's work here explores common pictorialist theme of the domestic, feminine activity. Light and symbolism invests ordinary domestic scenes with subtlety. Alvin Langdon Coburn, member of the American Photo Secession group, consciously explores the possibilities of photography as a tool for exploring abstract form. Gum printing, a combination of gum Arabic, potassium bichromate and colored pigment, was popular and promoted by artists such as Steichen and Coburn. Developed by John Pouncy 1n 1858, the process was taken up by photographers in the 1890's who fully investigated its potential for print manipulation, the process allowing great local control over tonality and detail and the use of painterly effects of color and texture. Photogravure, a technique was devised in 1879 by Karl Klic, was another process utilized. The photograph transferred to a copper plate that was etched, inked and printed on fine paper on a flat bed press to produce a limited edition of nearly identical prints. Emerson admired this softened image, believing the technique to be the photomechanical equivalent to the platinum print. Steiglitz's Camera Work, the quarterly magazine he published from 1903-1917, is the best-known example of gravure printing. Contemporary Uses In 1906 Kodak had begun to market platinum papers and ceased production in 1916. In the 1920's-30's platinum fell into disuse. A few photographers continued to work with platinum by hand mixing and coating their own materials but for the most part the platinotype had become a historical process. In the 1970' s George Tice published the 'Lost Art of Platinum Printing'. Irving Penn later exhibited hand made platinum prints. In 1979 William Crawford published 'The Keepers of the Light' with a major treatment of Platinum printing. In 1986 Mapplethorpe began printing images in platinum on linen. Unique pieces were framed with panels of fabric. He began producing photogravures on silk. In 1981 Bostick and Sullivan founded their mail order firm dedicated to supplying platinum and palladium printing materials. In 1988 the Steinbergs
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