copia de época

15:54 Oct 3, 2015 

Exactly, it is a text about how the exhibition of the photographer's work was prepared (a "metodología expositiva"). Perhaps I should have mentioned this earlier.

15:47 Oct 3, 2015 

I don't read it like that. I don't think it's clear that the author is describing making new images from the photographer's negatives, except in cases where no original print or reproduction was available. That's what the text we have says.

I understood this to refer to an exhibition ("A la hora de presentar las fotografías hemos procurado seguir las pautas por las que él se guió en sus exposiciones"). For exhibitions, vintage prints are always preferred if they exist, and they used them where they could. If not, they used later author prints ("lifetime" prints), or failing that, reproductions, and, as a last resort, where no original print was available, they made new modern prints from the negatives.

I didn't understand this to be referring to producing a book; the text we have, with the reference to presenting the photos with white passe-partout, suggests an exhibition to me. But even if it is about producing a book, the terms we're concerned with mean the same.

For reproduction in a book, a vintage or at least early print will be the best source, better than the original negative, because a positive print shows how the photographer intended the image to look.

12:59 Oct 3, 2015 

It is clear, even from the limited context we have, that the ST author is describing the making of new images from the photographer’s negatives, not from prints. The ‘copias de época’ were used, when available, to help decide how the negatives should be processed for inclusion in the new work, to reflect the photographer’s intentions. One of the many variables is cropping, and if no ‘copias de época’ exist, then the ST says they reproduced (and 'inverted', in Pshop terms) the entire negative (= no cropping).

Although high-quality ‘original’ prints (‘impresiones’, not ‘copias’) made by the photographer himself as close as possible to the time of shooting the scene would be the best examples for this task, any ‘reproduction’ known/believed to represent the photographer’s intentions as to how the prints should be made from the negative would contribute to this research. That would include, for example, reproductions (‘copias’) appearing in an exhibition catalogue, in a photography ‘year-book’ of the kind much in vogue in the early 20th C, books and other media where the photographs may have been used as illustrations, etc.

23:13 Oct 2, 2015 

No, no, of course not. I'm not proposing it as a translation of "copia de época" (which I am now quite sure should be "vintage print"). I'm suggesting it might be used for "copia de autor", now that we know the latter does not refer to a print made at the time the photo was taken, as I first assumed. If you want me to acknowledge my errors, I willingly acknowledge that one.

I've addressed the question of how to translate "copia de autor" as well because ideally we want to help darwinista establish an appropriate set of terms for all these things.

Now that we have fuller context, it seems clear that they are saying their first choice is "copias de época", failing which they will use "copias de autor", and if they can't get them either they'll use modern prints.

In English, the most valued and valuable prints are vintage prints. Less valuable are lifetime prints, and less valuable still are modern prints. I think the correspondence is satisfactory.

23:04 Oct 2, 2015 

The 2nd webref in your latest discussion post makes it clear that a 'lifetime print' can be made (at least) as many as 30 years after the photographer clicked the shutter. There's no way that can be considered equivalent to Asker's ST: ""copia de época.

22:17 Oct 2, 2015 

This changes things, but it confirms my feeling that "vintage print" is the way to go for "copia de época". As I've said, I thought that by "copia de autor" they meant a vintage print made by the author. This is apparently not so; they simply meant a print made by the author at any time. "Author's print" could cover that, I think, though a term to consider would be "lifetime print":

"Prints of Junior Interstate Ballroom Dance Champions, Yonkers, N. Y., signed by Arbus are rare. In addition to the present print, only one other lifetime print signed by the photographer is believed to have been offered at auction, a print sold in these rooms in October 1990."
http://www.sothebys.com/en/auctions/ecatalogue/2014/175-mast...

This is from an article on forgery of original photographs, and distinguishes "vintage" from "lifetime":

"He and Hochberg obtained independent confirmation that the Strands were indeed authentic lifetime prints; they dated from roughly 1960, even though the Rosenblums had claimed that two of these, too, were vintage prints from the 1930s."
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2003/06/too-much...

21:58 Oct 2, 2015 

Because this question is linked to the previous one for "tirar el negativo" I'll provide the excerpt of the text here for reference because the terms appear again (and I hope it helps):
A la hora de presentar las fotografías hemos procurado seguir las pautas por las que él se guió en sus exposiciones: fotografías enmarcadas con paspartú blanco, y, como criterio fundamental, hemos priorizado la selección de copias de época (realizadas por él mismo en el momento de tirar el negativo) y, cuando estas no existían, de copias de autor (realizadas por él posteriormente)

21:57 Oct 2, 2015 

I do not for a moment recognise that the webref I quoted derails my thesis. I emphatically reject that suggestion, for the simple reason that the statement in question, about vintage prints having to be signed by the author, is untrue.

I think I have clarified the difference. I don't know how I can make it any clearer. A "copia de época" is one that may or may not have been made by the author personally. A "copia de autor" is one that was made by the author personally. Both were produced at the time the photograph was taken, or within a short time (a year or so).

You say that "the ST refers to prints made contemporaneously with the exposure of the negative" (copias de época), and that "that's different to a print that was actually made by the author" (copias de autor). Exactly; that's what I'm saying.

We are talking about photographic prints made directly in the laboratory from the original negative at or very near the time the photograph was taken, by the author or in accordance with the author's wishes. Reproductions in a contemporary exhibition catalogue, even if supervised by the author, would of course be not be "copias de época", nor would they be vintage prints.

21:36 Oct 2, 2015 

Thank you for recognising the fact that the webref you quoted de-rails your thesis. The fact remains, however, that you have not clarified the difference, made in the ST, between 'copias de época' and '(copias de) autor'.

The whole problem here, of course, derives from that in the days of 'real' photography, no two prints from any given negative were ever forensically identical - even successive prints from the same negative made at 2-minute intervals by the (wo)man who earlier that day stood behind the camera and squeezed the bulb (pneumatic, not flash...).

The ST refers to prints made contemporaneously with the exposure of the negative, which are assumed to reflect the pictorial intentions of the author (photographer) as regards framing of the print, exposure, vignetting, special effects (achieved in thjose days by manual gestures under the enlarger, rather that by today's Ph***hop. Those copies may, for example, have appeared in contemporary exhibition catalogues. That's different to a print that was (or is assumed to have been) actually made by the author. It's an important distinction that's lost in 'vintage' - especially when the ST makes that very distinction.

21:16 Oct 2, 2015 

First, I explained the distinction between "copia de época" and "copia de autor"; it must turn on whether the print was made by the author personally or by another hand. But there is no doubt at all that a "copia de época" is by definition made at the time when the photograph was taken, or very soon afterwards. A print made in 1930, say, of a photograph taken in 1920 is not a copia de época, nor is it a vintage print.

Second, you say that the quotation "Such a print shall bear the author’s signature and be dated by the author himself", from my penultimate ref., is sufficient to de-rail my entire thesis. This is building a lot on one anomalous reference, which I now wish I hadn't quoted. It is not true that a vintage print has to be signed by the author, though it's more valuable if it is. Here, for example, is the definition from the Photographers' Gallery's Guide to Collecting:

"VINTAGE PRINT
A print made at the same time that the negative was made. In practice, this usually means within one or two years of the negative date. For example, a photograph taken in 1951 and printed in 1952 would be considered a vintage print"
http://thephotographersgallery.org.uk/guide-to-collecting