funny.
as i decide to write about my days in the darkroom, i worry that not
much will happen. ha! this week is interesting, just as any other
week really. monday: chien-chi chang. tuesday: al wertheimer and
ruven afanador. but before i go on with my week, you have to
understand: a printer's experience is but a list of photographers and
artists coming in to get their work done. without this list i am
nothing. without the images and negatives made by someone else, i
have nothing. in this sense, printing is very much like performing.
my performance happens in the dark behing closed doors. no one
really knows what i do once my door is closed and i go to work. what
matters is the end product, the print. as a matter of fact, very few
people care to know the details, most use the word “magic” to
describe a black and white print appearing slowly in the developer.
let me assure you, there is nothing magic about the process. a
silver gelatin print is the product of ingeneous chemists over many
years, and the technology used to make the emulsion is brilliant.
but i am getting off the subject, let's get back to the negative,
that fragile piece of acetate that holds all the information. there
are so many ways to interpret a negative, i usually need to make a
work print, a first approach if you will, so the conversation can
start on how to proceed. it is a long process, and the more i know
the photographer the more i'll get out of the negative. i need to
see the image through their eyes. i do feel a bit schizophrenic some
days, going from one type of print to the next, but a good print is
only good if the photographer likes it. i have to adapt to their
style and vision. most of the time it is a joint effort, but now and
then, i just match prints that have been done many times by several
printers before me. this week i am doing a little bit of both. an
image of elvis presley by al wertheimer shot in 1956 -that's 10 years
before i was born-, a print of the cover of torero by ruven afanador,
which i've made many times in different sizes, new images by mauro
restife of the philip johnson glass house, and the dalai lama by
chien-chi chang. sizes ranging from 16x20 to 54x81 inches, some
warmtone, or glossy, or matte, etc. every image has a story behind
it, and i need to hear about it before i print.
this
is not a blog about printing techniques, it's about how a print ends
up looking the way it does. my best prints happen when i'm able to
break the rules of printing. another important part of my work is
the vocabulary used to describe a printed image: too flat, too
dark... is just the begining, and it ends up being: i don't get the
feeling that the sunlight is coming through the leaves strong
enough... there's no special setting for that. but if i'm outside
on a sunny day with that particular photographer, and they seem to
squint more than i do, i know their understanding of brightness is
not as bright as mine -or vice-versa-.
the
week is getting to an end, and already bob gruen has brought in a
couple of iconic negatives, which i could almost print with my eyes
closed by now. next week is his birthday, and i have a soccer game
to play tonight. the numbers associated with bob's tina turner
picture pop into my head, something like 52-11-2. but chien-chi will
be here soon, and i have to show him the two 40x60 in. prints i made
for him, so we can make sure they compliment each other, they will be
displayed at art-paris together. almost time to dump the 7 gallons
of developer i used today and rinse the sinks. next week promises to
be filled with new images, and i haven't even talked about processing
film yet...
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