To help preserve her works, Cindy Sherman is offering to destroy and reprint old photographs

[Arthurwg]

Do purchasers of her original prints have recourse to sue her for depreciating the value of the print they bought, especially if they were sold as let's say one of 50? After all, when you produce additional quantities, you decrease the value as they're less scarce.

They will no longer be "original prints." And I agree. This is absurd.

She will destroy the original old prints so the number of total prints in circulation will stay the same

Will she recall the original prints from owners? Can't be done.

 

[Arthurwg]

Someone should inkjet print this photo (after a bit of photoshop to fix it a bit, of course):

View attachment 401255
and burn the original, which I hear is easily damaged by exposure to light. Clearly, a newly printed copy would be better.

I have seen a "colorized" version of this picture.

 

[Cholentpot]

The argument that follows remains in its core based on what your own, particular visual preference is. That's OK, but I don't think we can ever reach common ground on that basis, other than some not very interesting observations, like that many photographers strive to make pretty pictures.

If we all agreed the world would be a drab and boring place.

 

[Don_ih]

Will she recall the original prints from owners? Can't be done.

A replacement print would only be made and provided to someone who submits a print to be replaced.

 

[TJones]

They will no longer be "original prints." And I agree. This is absurd.

Will she recall the original prints from owners? Can't be done.

This is a voluntary process. And private collectors will have to pay $10k for the swap.

 

[Carnie Bob]

Yeah, I'd say the 'hand made' aspect counts, assuming you're referring to optical enlargements and not digitally exposed "Lambda" etc prints. And here, too, the puzzling question is: if you take a Lambda/LightJet/etc C-print and put it next to an optical enlargement, and assuming the prints look more or less the same - are they fundamentally different? I feel they are, but I may not be able to tell them apart. What gives...?

I have done both lambda and optical enlarger C print murals and I can say one cannot see the difference..

 

[Carnie Bob]

Also, that fee is waived for institutions. There's no sign of greed being a motive in this at all. Wanting to preserve the visibility of her work, yes. She likely has seen some prints that have degraded and genuinely doesn't like it.



One of the best points made so far.

I believe Don is correct , it probably pisses her off that the prints are fading and she is trying to do something about it.
Most other artists I know silently behind the scenes replace the prints.

 

[Cholentpot]

I believe Don is correct , it probably pisses her off that the prints are fading and she is trying to do something about it.
Most other artists I know silently behind the scenes replace the prints.

Say I paid 3 million for a print, and it starts to fade. I'd insist the artist create a new print using the original method. If I already paid 3 million another $10k isn't going to bother me much. However I would insist that the original fading print not be destroyed. It can be defaced to the point that it's not worth anything on the market or even given to a museum but to wholesale destroy it I'd not want to be part of that.

 

[warden]

Say I paid 3 million for a print, and it starts to fade. I'd insist the artist create a new print using the original method. If I already paid 3 million another $10k isn't going to bother me much. However I would insist that the original fading print not be destroyed. It can be defaced to the point that it's not worth anything on the market or even given to a museum but to wholesale destroy it I'd not want to be part of that.

The challenge with insisting on a reprint of older work is when we're talking about prints worth seven figures the artist is usually long out of the picture. This is Bezos selling a print via an auction house to Musk, and the artist has no say in what happens with their work. In this case Sherman is making a public offer to make the owner of her work happier with their print by reprinting it.

Destroying the original bothers me too. I'm wondering if another photographer will find a better way to handle this. The edition of prints must not grow or lawyers will get involved for sure, but I think it would be preferable to somehow decommission a print without destroying it.

 

[Don_ih]

While it's ideologically horrifying to destroy the original prints and replace them with newly printed (probably on a printer) copies, I'm sure the end result will be better than a stack of blank sheets of paper that "once had a photo" on them.

 

[Don_ih]

That reminds me of a frame I bought at a thrift store a couple of years ago. It looked like it had a blurry faded blue-toned print in it but, when I took it out, under the matt I could see that it was originally a full-colour image. I should've take a picture of that but I just threw it away. You really couldn't pick out anything in the photo other than it was someone near a house. It was in one of those aluminum frames you get at Micheals.

 

[DREW WILEY]

From the era involved, the Cindy prints hypothetically being replaced would have most likely been ordinary commercial quality optically enlarged Kodak C prints. I've seen a number of those. Competently done, but nothing special. This paper didn't respond as well to laser enlargement as current Fuji papers. Banding was also a typical symptom of early Lambda prints. Of course, everything did, and still does, depend on the skill of the specific operator involved.

Framing? It's disgusting how much that has slipped into mediocrity even with photography making pretense to high value.

 

[Milpool]

Say I paid 3 million for a print, and it starts to fade. I'd insist the artist create a new print using the original method. If I already paid 3 million another $10k isn't going to bother me much. However I would insist that the original fading print not be destroyed. It can be defaced to the point that it's not worth anything on the market or even given to a museum but to wholesale destroy it I'd not want to be part of that.

Why? It’s just a print, and you have the nice new one.

 

[MattKing]

Why? It’s just a print, and you have the nice new one.

And the likely certification from Ms. Sherman authenticating its extremely individual provenance.

 

[Cholentpot]

Why? It’s just a print, and you have the nice new one.

People of my generation (millennials) put a lot into the old hand processed stuff. Getting a scan printed onto paper means nothing. Any yahoo can do that. While I don't particularly admire Mz Sherman's style I can respect the skill that goes into making an optical print. It's not just a print. Craft went into it.

From the era involved, the Cindy prints hypothetically being replaced would have most likely been ordinary commercial quality optically enlarged Kodak C prints. I've seen a number of those. Competently done, but nothing special. This paper didn't respond as well to laser enlargement as current Fuji papers. Banding was also a typical symptom of early Lambda prints. Of course, everything did, and still does, depend on the skill of the specific operator involved.

Framing? It's disgusting how much that has slipped into mediocrity even with photography making pretense to high value.

Framing? That's for the Amish.

 

[DREW WILEY]

Non-framing? That's a guarantee of a display print getting ruined. What option do you have in mind? Thumb tacks?

 

[Don_ih]

People of my generation (millennials) put a lot into the old hand processed stuff.

What? 1% of them, if that? I doubt they're any more "into it" than any other generation at this point. It's irrelevant to the issue at hand, anyway.

 

[Cholentpot]

What? 1% of them, if that? I doubt they're any more "into it" than any other generation at this point. It's irrelevant to the issue at hand, anyway.

I've found that those that are older than I are still dazzled by the wonder tech out there. 'Wow! Inkjet printers! Photoshop! AI! megapixels!'

This attitude might not be prevalent on this website but I bump into it all the time IRL. Sometimes to the point of hostility, 'Why would anyone want to shoot film anymore?'

 

[Willyekerslike]

Threads merged.

While I like a lot of Cindy Sherman's work when I see it, because I find the ideas behind it and the execution of those ideas to have value, the subject of this thread has nothing to do with the images.
It has to do with the Art Market value of individual artifacts - the original prints, made in extremely limited quantities - and a possible way of preserving that value when and if the original artifact begins to deteriorate.
Who knows whether the Art Market will accept the substitution, and maintain the associated prices.

 

[Carnie Bob]

From the era involved, the Cindy prints hypothetically being replaced would have most likely been ordinary commercial quality optically enlarged Kodak C prints. I've seen a number of those. Competently done, but nothing special. This paper didn't respond as well to laser enlargement as current Fuji papers. Banding was also a typical symptom of early Lambda prints. Of course, everything did, and still does, depend on the skill of the specific operator involved.

Framing? It's disgusting how much that has slipped into mediocrity even with photography making pretense to high value.

banding was and is due to the lower quality image file and on top poor editing methods , not the paper or machine the print was made . I worked on original Lambda machines, the saying then and still today garbage in garbage out.

 

[DREW WILEY]

Yeah, Bob. Some labs never did get it quite right, but managed to struggle along anyway because they were really nice people and concentrated on smaller amateur work. The option was Chromira prints, which could lend a bit of a Pointellistic look instead if examined closely. But Fuji papers have undergone at least two significant upgrades in the meantime to make them more responsive in terms of contrast and saturation. The last Lightjet print shop in this neighborhood switched over the inkjet. In the meantime, a former full service lab has just moved into a bigger space once again to potentially resurrect direct large optical enlargement of RA4, or if that fails, at least traditional b&w hand enlargements, for which there is a distinct renewed demand. They had a lot of equipment still in storage. We'll see.

All these kinds of businesses are at the mercy of commercial lease rates. A number of them had to shut their doors during the pandemic, while the same event opened up other location opportunities. The biggest wholesale frame shop, which could handle prints up to 40 ft wide, made the mistake of moving to an unsafe neighborhood near the Port and up-sizing just too much. Now it's just another big abandoned building covered with graffiti. Unfortunate timing.

The ebb and flow of street crime is yet another significant factor in terms of location-based business failures or successes. Same goes for the urban "art colonies" or collectives. City planners think they'll upgrade dicey neighborhood, and offer them zoning incentives; and then they just get driven out by either entrenched crime, or by the opposite, unaffordable gentrification.

 

[Alan Edward Klein]

I believe Don is correct , it probably pisses her off that the prints are fading and she is trying to do something about it.
Most other artists I know silently behind the scenes replace the prints.

She's charging $10,000 per picture from the goodness of her heart? Such generosity!

 

[Alan Edward Klein]

And the likely certification from Ms. Sherman authenticating its extremely individual provenance.

What happens if her estate continues the practice after she dies?

 

[Don_ih]

She's charging $10,000 per picture from the goodness of her heart? Such generosity!

So, really. What's the problem with charging a fee to do that? When one of her prints sold for $3.9 million, it wasn't just after she printed it. That's not what she sold it for.

I guess you think she should do it for nothing for private collectors. She's already not charging institutions.

What's wrong with her making money?

 

[nikos79]

What's wrong with her making money?

Nothing i actually admire her.

It might not be relevant at all but nevertheless I will share two quotes by Andrei Tarkovsky:

"The particular function of art is not, as often claimed, to propagate ideas, to transmit thoughts, to serve as an example. The purpose of art is to prepare a person for death, to plough and cultivate his soul, turning it towards the good."

"Indeed, it's so easy to shoot a scene beautifully just for effect, for the praise of others... However, it's enough to take just one step in this direction, and you're lost."