A Journey Toward The Sacred Print With Stephen Johnson

May 7, 2021, 12:30pm - 1:30pm

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Among Photography’s first renderings were the 1835 negative prints of Fox-Talbot. His “Pencil of Nature” book was the first photographic book. Photo printmaking has evolved through ever growing value of the print in hand. With virtual screen-based photo experiences now dominating our photographic world, the value of a unique and finely crafted print may be now become a dying art or even more valuable.      

Many of us who became photographers in the silver age gained an appreciation of the hard work and demanding aesthetics of a beautiful fine art print. This led to an almost sacred relationship between the photographer, their experience and the print in hand.

Digital photography and high-quality inkjet printing have given us an unprecedented access to push-button printing. As casual prints became ever easier to make, they have also been displaced by screen views as our fundamental photographic experiences. We now have ever greater power to control the craft of our digital prints and pigment-based inks that outlive most all conventional color processes. Concurrently, as digital data grows in volume and challenges in holding onto it, the print as archive may well become the most best realized, valued and long lasting version of our life’s work.

The fine art darkroom and the craft now possible in the digital realm is the evolution traced in this talk by photographer Stephen Johnson as he walks through his personal, emotional and technical journey pushing this digital revolution into being.

Steve’s work in digital printing has included working with Hahnemühle on the design of their Museum Etching paper. He documents that story in an April 2009 article for Studio Photography.