[ART]_CONnected

MULTIMEDIA - OLD STYLE

Yesterday I have been to an event hosted by Boston's Photographic Resource Center (if you ever come to Boston, have a look at their website before, there are always interesting events, workshops and lectures). At this event, an auction of rarely seen portfolios and prints from the PRC vault, I discovered a portfolio of a photographer I never heard about before: Todd Walker. It was a portfolio of 21 prints from 1980, called "Fragments of Melancholy". I was immediately fascinated by the mixture of different art technics he used. So I did some research to learn more about him and his work (and no, I was not able to purchase the portfolio at the auction - couldn't compete against the Bostonian upper class people at the auction ;-)).

So here is a little bit I found out:

Todd Walker (1917-1998), an American photographer, printmaker and creator of artist's books, is known for his manipulated images and his use of offset lithography to produce individual prints and limited-edition books of his work.

An innovative technician with a continuing interest in alternative printing processes, Walker played a role in the late 1960s and the 1970s in expanding the prevailing attitudes about creative photography, pushing against the conventional boundaries of the practice. For the last thirty years of his career he was also a devoted educator at a number of universities.

From the colophon of the Portfolio:

The type, handset Garamont & Bembo, roman and italic, with a little Century expanded & Bankscript, was proved on a Vandercook 215 proofing press. From my original camera negatives, either film transparencies or silver prints were the first visual step. The halftone negatives are of 200 lines per inch. Each of the twenty sheets was printed from four to eight times an a 'Zenobia', my Royal Zenith 14x20 single color offset lithographic press. The inks were hand mixed on the press as each color was to be printed. All phases of the conception, preparation and printing were done by Todd Walker.

This mixture of different kind of typesetting, photographs and paints, is what fascinated me. Unfortunately i couldn't find any pictures from the portfolio "Fragments of Melancholy", but here are some other examples of his work - and just remember: this has been done long time before Photoshop...

If you ever learn about some of his portfolios for sale, please let me know...