Photographs used to be printed on actual postcard stock, including lines on the back for address and text. One of my favourite photographers, André Kertész, when he first moved to Paris sent postcards he printed himself back to his family in Hungary. They are today almost priceless (literally). His Satiric Dancer from 1926, printed on postcard stock sold at auction for US$ 567,000 last year.
A picture postcard dropped through your mailbox with a note on the back, written in longhand, - not printed on a computer - is personal. Sent with feeling! It means that someone cares and thinks about you and invested the time.
Print some and send some. Who knows what you might start!
Part of why I do my Substack. I have a huge collection of stuff - photos, audio, text, old letters etc. I fear that those in digital form are ephemera and not likely to survive my passing by more than a few years. That is why I try to print all my posts and collect the hard copy in a box which will survive at least until the cockroaches do their work. More than just photos - some of the people and context captured.
Just pulled out a carefully stored CD and spent some hours searching for its reader - the disk is dead after <10 years.
Some discussion of how to keep ones "digital archive" alive would be interesting.
Hey Richard, nice post!
Photographs used to be printed on actual postcard stock, including lines on the back for address and text. One of my favourite photographers, André Kertész, when he first moved to Paris sent postcards he printed himself back to his family in Hungary. They are today almost priceless (literally). His Satiric Dancer from 1926, printed on postcard stock sold at auction for US$ 567,000 last year.
A picture postcard dropped through your mailbox with a note on the back, written in longhand, - not printed on a computer - is personal. Sent with feeling! It means that someone cares and thinks about you and invested the time.
Print some and send some. Who knows what you might start!
I agree.
I was a custom printer for a long time. Tens of thousands of prints and enlargements under my belt.
It is a shame we have lost the tremendous variety of films and papers.
Cheers.
…love this Richard…i am thinking of printing around 1K of my
photos and then lining a room full wallpaper with them…always small ideas over here…maybe i’ll start by just printing a few and giving them away…
I need to print mine much more.
Thanks for the pointer there. Fascinating pics you’ve got there. Would love to see a photo book some time?
I've been thinking about a photo book for a bit, closest at the moment I am working on is a zine : )
Nice. I’ll buy a copy for sure. A book is a lot of investment- time and money wise.
Part of why I do my Substack. I have a huge collection of stuff - photos, audio, text, old letters etc. I fear that those in digital form are ephemera and not likely to survive my passing by more than a few years. That is why I try to print all my posts and collect the hard copy in a box which will survive at least until the cockroaches do their work. More than just photos - some of the people and context captured.
Just pulled out a carefully stored CD and spent some hours searching for its reader - the disk is dead after <10 years.
Some discussion of how to keep ones "digital archive" alive would be interesting.
https://theoneabout.substack.com/