When did you last buy a B+W Silver gelatin print and how much did you pay.

[RobC]

I'm curious. The topic says it all really except the image size and whether it included framing would be useful too. I'm not really interested in who the photographer/printer was but you can add that too if you like.

 

[Hatchetman]

About 5 years ago I paid $30 total for two different 5x7 prints from negatives that I shot myself. This was before I had my own darkroom setup.

 

[Alan W]

I bought a 10x10 from a local photographer for $90,I then paid a little over $100 to have it matted and framed behind that no glare type glass.This was about two years ago.I'm looking at it right now.

 

[benjiboy]

I'm curious. The topic says it all really except the image size and whether it included framing would be useful too. I'm not really interested in who the photographer/printer was but you can add that too if you like.

Are you buying art, or wallpaper ?

 

[RobC]

Are you buying art, or wallpaper ?

I didn't say I was buying anything. I'm asking the question of you. I don't care if you're buying art or wall paper.

 

[jimjm]

Only time I've bought another photographer's print, and really the only artwork I own of any significant value. Paid about $2,000 6 years ago, and worth every penny to me as W. Eugene Smith is one of my favorite photographers.

A Life magazine archives press print from 1951 of Eugene's Smith's "Spanish Wake" from the April 1951 essay "Spanish Village". Example here: http://www.magnumphotos.com/image/PAR168828.html .

Print is a bit creased, but has about a dozen remarks and stamps on back, like "Used in Life - April 9, 1951", "Used in Life - 50th Anniv." and "Famous Picture, Do Not Circulate". As well as being a great image, it's the historical value that means the most to me, as well as the possibility that Smith made this print himself. From what I've read, around this time he was one of the few Life photogs who insisted on, and was permitted by the editors to make all his own prints for the magazine.

 

[bdial]

I bought a print a few years ago for around $75.00, as I recall.

 

[welly]

About a year and a half ago. It cost me $110 but the guy was doing it deal. It's a lovely print. I'm thinking about buying more prints.

 

[David Brown]

A few months ago - $125.

I generally do trades of prints with other photographers. None of us are getting rich off of silver gelatin ...

 

[Bob Carnie]

I bought a photogravure for a friend... country doctor Eugene Smith.. I paid around $750 for it .

I also make most of my clients provide me with a printers proof of their work . over the years I have amassed a rather decent collection.

I once did a rather large scanning and printing job for a single diptick print series.. it was John and Yoko in bed, give peace a chance. I treasure these prints..

Not sure what I am going to do with the collection when my time comes, I would really like a good home for them. If I totally suck at my business maybe I
will be forced to sell them to survive.

I think purchasing the right photographers work can be a very rewarding experience.. you get to enjoy them on your walls and in some cases the value does go up.
Paul Paletti a member here spoke at our gallery about this very topic just last week during Contact. He has one of the nicest private collections of photographs that I have seen. He is located in
Louisville .

 

[Xmas]

Are you buying art, or wallpaper ?

Is there a difference apart from fixative?
Some wall paper is Walt Disney graphics...

 

[RobC]

seems not many people here buy B+W silver gelatin prints or they are just keeping quiet about it.

 

[dpurdy]

Never have in my 40 years as a photographer. I did buy a platinum print off ebay once from a guy who was a friend and had bought one of mine.
I have had lots of gelatine silver prints given to me or traded to me but I don't have any on display, they are all in a folder in a file cabinet.
Dennis

 

[dosilverhalide]

A few years ago I donated $250.00 to a photographer doing a social history . For this amount you got an 8X10, black and white. I did like what the photographer was doing, but the main reason I wanted the print was to compare it to my own prints and see if I was in the ball park quality wise. I was not impress with the print and a crease in the print was thrown in for free. J.

 

[removed account4]

i got 3 liquor boxes full of prints and negatives from a friend of a photographer who died ..
it cost the price of the gas to get there and back ( couple of bucks ) ... HUNDReDS of negatives
photo albums, even secret magic books ...

 

[MattKing]

One - from Donald Miller.

A few more colour.

I've given lots, and received trades too.

 

[Bill Burk]

RobC,

I'm ashamed to admit I have bought relatively few Silver Gelatin prints over time. Stupid really, considering how much I appreciate them. I should be buying and collecting actively.

At a street fair show once I talked with a photographer who used the Zone System to get true high-key white sands and buildings shots. I bought one but can't remember the price. Later I took it out of its frame and found out the print is Resin Coated (which I don't love as much as fiber based prints).

At a local fund-raiser for Zanmi Lakay I was fascinated by the black and white postcards and had an opportunity to buy the original of one of my favorites a shadow boxing shot on 11x14. I paid what I could afford, think it was forty dollars. This print remains in my "portfolio" where I get to see it whenever I look through my own photographs.

Our local second-hand (estate buyer) shop in town occasionally has a few prints. One day I noticed a batch of unusually high quality amateur work, so I picked up a half dozen for a few bucks each. Gave a couple to some friends and kept the rest for myself.

Otherwise, the Silver Gelatin prints that I have are from friends or exchanges (the best way I know to increase your collection!).

 

[filmamigo]

I bought an 8x20 contact print, framed, of Michael A. Smith's "Rio Nell'Elba, Isola d'Elba, Tuscany." It was offered in a print sale through The Online Photographer. Print was $350, framing was $100.

It's a beautiful photo, but I also wanted to own a reference print --- how sharp can a print possibly be? An 8x20 contact print (no enlarging) has allowed me to calibrate my eyes

 

[rorye]

Michael Kenna's French Canal,TYBW, 8"x8". It moves me every single time I look at it.

 

[RobC]

Michael Kenna's French Canal,TYBW, 8"x8". It moves me every single time I look at it.

I'm a big fan of his work too. Infact my favourite photographer. Although he has produced some work fairly recently which I wasn't so keen on.

I have never bought any B+W prints to my shame. But I was instrumental in getting a client to buy 5 of Kennas images for use in a website.

 

[Vaughn]

Just to complicate things, I traded photographs with a friend and photographer, Geir Jordahl. The prints we traded are in the $3500 range (we both have sold similar images at these prices, so they were market prices).

PS -- his print was silver gelatin, mine were carbon prints.

 

[Andrew O'Neill]

I have bought silver prints by David Vestal, Paul Schranze, and some die transfers from Ctein, all through the now defunct PT magazine. Most I have have been from trading with other photographers. Matt K. and Eddie, we still need to do that print exchange!

 

[ozphoto]

Back in 2001 I purchased hand a printed 8x10 for GBP80, from British fashion & celebrity photographer, Alwyn Coates.

It was a limited edition from his "Voller Corsets" series - I just fell in love with the image and actually contacted him after seeing a piece on his latest (at the time) shoot for the company, in BJP magazine.

Exchanged emails and I went to a small, professional hand printing lab (in Soho), to pay my cash on the Monday, before collecting the wonderful print on the Friday. It's the only photograph I've ever actually purchased from a photographer, although I did toy with purchasing an original image by Roy Schatt a few years back, but the cost was slightly out of my price range at that time.

 

[DannL.]

It's been quite a while since I purchased a print. Finding original / signed prints in the wild, which are by well known photographic artists, is a daunting task. The last time was Sept 2009. I stepped into an antiques store in a sleepy Oklahoma town, and before the hour was out I was in possession of two original/signed Dorothea Lange prints, a signed print by Photo-secessionist Olive M. Potts, three signed portraits of Grace Cristie by Underwood & Underwood, and three prints (one work-up print and two finished) that most likely originated from Clarence H Whites school of photography. What I failed to clearly recognize, and to this day I kick myself in the head for being so blind, was two original & signed prints by Peder Sather Bruguière. Before twenty-four hours had passed, someone else snapped them up. I learned a great lesson that day. As far as prices paid . . . We never talk prices. ;-)

 

[PeterAM]

The last ones that I bought were in 2005, at a flea market outside of Santa Fe; two beautiful, small (around 4X6), badly matted prints, that I paid maybe $10 each for. They were done by a local SF photographer and are quite beautiful. For a few years in the '90's my daughter was one of the managers of a very well known NYC gallery and gifted me with several prints by some pretty well known photographers (Lilo Raymond & Bruce Cratsley) and some less well known folks; don't know what she paid.
The last two prints that I bought have been quite large and are inkjet prints. One was shot on film, the other digital.