Hi Paul, interesting reading indeed but I find your statement that it
.. may spur further research to how we print n for who.....
rather frighting, and I shall explain why.
In the text you refer to there is no differentiation in the type of images displayed, colour photographs and monochrome photographs are all just referred to as photographs despite being produced by differing chemical process. Colour photographs are produced by dyes that are lied down in proportion to the amount of silver in the image, silver that is subsequently removed from the image. These colour images are, I would have thought, rather more susceptible to fading than a B & W silver image that is formed from metallic silver that is unlikely to fade. There maybe other issues with silver gelatin images relating to improper processing but exposure to a reasonable amount of light I would not have thought to degrade the silver itself to a detrimental level. There is however the point that the paper base may suffer and discolour as a result of exposure to light, which brings me to my second point. I understand that many papers bases use optical brighteners to create brilliance in the print, these brighteners are activated, as well as degraded by UV light. Displaying a print made on a paper base that contains optical brighteners under a light source that contains no UV will lessen the brilliance of the image that the photographer was trying to portray, which brings me to my third point. It is the job of the photographer to create images, the job of the curator to display those images and the job of the conservator to protect them. We, as photographers, should create images as we see fit and not to some specification as defined by curators or conservators. If a curator wants to display a work they should do their best to display it as the creator intended it to be displayed and if I intend my work to be displayed in a room illuminated by flaming oil drums of diesel while thunderflashes go off every 30 seconds then that is how they should display it, and as for the conservators they can pick up the pieces and do what they want with them after. There are many works of art that have been created in recent years that have been defined by there own destruction, why should photographers adhere to the idea that there images should last a thousand years? When you buy a new car for £20,000 the manufacture dose not expect you to still be driving it in 300 years time and yet some of the earliest cars survive, not because they were built with superior materials and design but because a few individuals decided they were worth preserving and that is what gives them there current value. Create your work as you see fit and if you want to use fixer that is so exhausted that the image is destroyed after a few months so be it.