Vox Linea / platinum print / EPC #17
For a little while now, I’ve been interested in the idea of creating an edition that would somehow speak about the history of photography, and its ongoing relevance to the digital, so it seemed beautifully serendipitous when I stumbled across Max Caffell and 31 Studio, who inhabit some part of the intersection between those two things.
Max, and his father Paul before him, have been creating platinum prints from their studio in Stroud for some of the most interesting names in modern and contemporary photography, including David Bailey, Don McCullin, Simon Starling, and Sebastião Salgado, amongst many others.
I don’t know when I first became aware of platinum printmaking, many years ago now I think, perhaps during a formative visit to the Fox Talbot Museum in Laycock in the eighties. It’s been a medium that has always interested me, largely for the softened beauty and delicate tonal range of the finished prints, as well as the extraordinarily glamourous history of the medium.
Platinum printing dates back to the 1840s, but as you’ll appreciate, lost out to the silver halide process that has been the mainstay of black and white darkroom practice right up to the present day, although darkroom work has become quite a niche activity now, largely as a result of the digital revolution and ink based digital printmaking, which allows for extraordinarily fine control over the density and tonal range of contemporary prints. That said, I continue to be fascinated by what is being gained, and what is being lost, in our relentless transition to the digital, so of course, this project seemed a perfect match for the Print Club.
The decision to press ahead, despite the costs involved, was quite easy, as I felt I had an image in progress that would work perfectly as a platinum print. As often as not, when I’m drawing new pieces, I tend to make a number of monochrome studies to test the underlying form, before starting on the colour work, and in the case of Vox Linea, I felt that the monochrome studies could have a life of their own, that was worth investigating further.
So after a good day working with maybe a dozen or so black and white images, and a series of high contrast HDR, and solarised versions to mix and edit from, I completed the artwork for the platinum print, proof printed it in the studio here, and then sent a copy over to Max at 31 Studio for his subtle reinterpretation.
In order to make the final print, there needs to be a digital internegative, so Max output the digital drawing onto film, and started work on a proof print, to be followed up by the main edition. The final print was always going to be fairly diminutive, as the platinum process is wildly expensive, for all the obvious reasons, so in the end we settled on a 6x8 inch piece, or thereabouts, for the final EPC edition.
I hadn’t realised that platinum printing is a UV process, not a darkroom one, so I was quite surprised to see images of the work in progress taken in a well lit daylight studio. I’m attaching a few of those images for interest here. As we were still locked down with the Coronavirus, all of this was carried out remotely, of course, a huge shame, as at a different time, I would’ve loved to see Max’s studio in person, and maybe even watched him at work. Although I’m not sure if that’s allowed!
We are going to work on a follow up edition, in conjunction with Close Ltd, so hopefully there’ll be an opportunity to revisit the idea, and the studio, in the not too distant future.
I’ll leave it there for now, and attach a handful of images of the work in progress, plus a couple of good shots of the final print. I hope you’ll feel it’s a good addition to the Print Club. For my next piece, edition #18, it’s going to be colour all the way! And you won’t be surprised to hear that I’m hoping to have it ready to edition around the time of the summer solstice.
I’ll look forward to telling you more about the progress for that piece, working title Xgen, in due course…
Best - Chuck
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Vox Linea / platinum print EPC
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Edition of 20, plus 4 APs
Platinum print on archival fine art paper
Printed by Max Caffell at 31 Studio, March 2021
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Sheet size 166mm W x 196mm H
Image size 154mm W x 183mm H
