Edward Burtynsky, “The 10,000-year Gallery”
July 24th, 02008 by Stewart Brand
Stone ink gallery
Photographer Edward Burtynsky made a formal proposal for a permanent art gallery in the chamber that encloses the 10,000-year Clock in its Nevada mountain. The gallery would consist of art in materials as durable as the alloy steel and jade of the Clock itself, and it would be curated slowly over the centuries to reflect changing interests in the rolling present and the accumulating past.
Photographs in particular should be in the 10,000-year Gallery, Burtynsky said, “because they tell us more than any previous medium. When we think of our own past, we tend to think in terms of family photos.”
But photographic prints, especially color prints, degrade badly over time. Burtynsky went on a quest for a technical solution. He thought that automobile paint, which holds up to harsh sunlight, might work if it could be run through an inkjet printer, but that didn’t work out. Then he came across a process first discovered in 1855, called “carbon transfer print.” It uses magenta, cyan, and yellow inks made of ground stone—the magenta stone can only be found in one mine in Germany—and the black ink is carbon.
On the stage Burtynsky showed a large carbon transfer print of one of his ultra-high resolution photographs. The color and detail were perfect. Accelerated studies show that the print could hang in someone’s living room for 500 years and show no loss of quality. Kept in the Clock’s mountain in archival conditions it would remain unchanged for 10,000 years. He said that making one print takes five days of work, costs $2,000, and only ten artisans in the world have the skill, at locations in Toronto, Seattle, and Cornwall. Superb images can be made on porcelain (or Clock chamber walls), but Burtynsky prefers archival watercolor paper, because the ink bonds deep into the paper, and in the event of temperature changes, the ink and paper would expand and contract together.
The rest of the presentation was of beautiful and evocative photographs from three demonstration exhibits for the proposed gallery—”Museum of the Mundane” by Vid Ingelvics; “Observations from a Blue Planet” by Marcus Schubert; and “In the Wake of Progress” by Burtynsky himself. A typical Burtynsky photograph showed a huge open pit copper mine. A tiny, barely discernible black line on one of the levels was pointed out: “That’s a whole railroad train.” Alberta tar sands excavation tearing up miles of boreal forest. China’s Three Gorges Dam. Mine tailing ponds beautiful and terrible. Expired oil fields stretching to the horizon. Michelangelo’s marble quarry at Carrera, still working.
“This is the sublime of our time,” said Burtynsky, “shown straight on, for contemplation.” Indeed worth studying for centuries.
–Stewart Brand
July 25th, 2008 at 3:30 pm
Hmm, a strange and surprising endeavor for an artist known for their environmental and social awareness.
I recently read that certain elements will soon become extinct, due to limited supplies and the high demand from manufacturers of flat-screen televisions and computer monitors.
And now Burtynsky (who photographs the environmental degradation that results from mining) plans to dive into the magenta stone that can only be found in one mine in Germany.
This seems hypocritical.
And who really needs a photograph to last for 10,000 years? The technology to produce exact reproductions of all of Burtynsky’s work already exists.
So this also seems egotistical.
July 25th, 2008 at 4:33 pm
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July 27th, 2008 at 3:34 pm
Interesting, the idea of preserving imagery that is inherently beautiful, yet manifests the destruction and thoughtlessness of our behaviors. While I savor the courageous work of Burtynsky, met him, connected with him at TED, watched the evolution of his work, I wonder if we could consider the preservations of imagery that celebrates, hope fully, the good things that we can accomplish together, as a mindful confederacy, as well…
?
Perhaps that’s part of the plan, too.
Both sides now, perhaps.
Beauty found, beauty seen — and perhaps held for 10,000 years
Tim Girvin | girvin@girvin.com | www.girvin.com
July 27th, 2008 at 4:53 pm
I’m curious about the process. Where is the inactive link on Seattle supposed to direct us?
July 28th, 2008 at 3:07 am
I disagree with the above post. most of what we know about ancient cultures these artifacts span the ages. our own culture is based on media that does not last. Its not like some archaeologist will dig up my hard disk in a thousand years an plug it in. Once the technology used to read it is gone most of our writings will disappear. there is a very strong possibility that we will leave no trace of ourselves once western culture fades or collapses, as all cultures do. our buildings will disappear there is no paper record (its mostly electronic). I think that it is a good thing to do. can you imagine seeing a photograph from 10,000 years ago!!! If it works our ancestors will be able to see the past in vivid colour.
July 28th, 2008 at 7:17 am
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July 28th, 2008 at 9:25 am
Why aren’t any of these prints shown here…stories about images should contain some of those images, and not just words…the only link to Seattle produces nothing but a dark grey screen for me…any links to images I can see?
Thanks though, interesting story..
July 28th, 2008 at 11:17 am
This sounds like the old Tricolor Carbro process, which was used mostly for advertising photography in the 1950s, not because it was archival but because it could be retouched easily. It was supplanted by the Dye-Transfer process which was used until digital image manipulation took over around 1990.
July 28th, 2008 at 3:38 pm
[…] Now he plans to go after the magenta stone that can only be found in one mine in Germany to make 10.000-year, $2000 prints because “when we think of our own past, we tend to think in terms of family […]
July 28th, 2008 at 6:06 pm
The most permanent media, probably, is some variety of the photoceramic process, whereupon pigments chemically resistant to the action of fused ceramic and glass compositions are fused into the structure of a ceramic base to give a permanent photographic image, more or less impervious to the elements and thus suitable for tombstones. This photographic process was once commonly used for this purpose in southern Italy and Europe.
It is still practiced today to some degree in the United States, although the modern results usually fall well short of what is technically possible. I believe Queen Victoria wore a photoceramic pendant of Price Albert.
If the ancient Romans had somehow been able to employ this process, many of the interesting and minute details of their everyday life could probably be reconstructed from close examination of the images on the photoceramic shards.
The substitution process was a version of the photoceramic process based on wet chemical replacement of the silver content in a wet plate image using a dissolved salt of a more inert precious metal, often iridium or gold. The collodion film image was separated from its supporting glass plate before or after chemical substitution. This thin film bearing the image was fired onto enameled copper or anther vitreous surface.
The dusting-on photoceramic process, as fully developed in England and Europe by about 1900 could, when practiced skillfully, record detail with about the tonal range and resolution of the best printing processes of the era. In other words it takes a good magnifying glass to see the finest features of carefully made photoceramic images that have been printed from diapositives made from collodion wet plates, and the possible image resolution is unknown.
The British Journal of Photography from before 1900 has a number of recipes, mostly based on the light exposure and photo-polymerization of a soluble chromate, a colloid base, and some type of sugar coated on a surface, dried, exposed under a transparent positive image. The sticky layer was then dusted over with pigment, with or without subsequent image transfer before firing. As with the substitution process, the very best results probably result from the transfer of the dusted image over to a fresh ceramic base using a support film before firing.
The traditional ceramic coloring pigments containing cobalt and other metal oxides or vitreous solvent resistant spinels can be used to form an image. Soluble colorants can diffuse sideways into the vitreous surface and lose detail, but precious metals like gold, iridium, platinum and palladium don’t dissolve. The best insoluble colorant for making jet black images is reputed to have been iridium.
It is also possible to fire images between layers of glass. For example dusted-on images made from chemically precipitated gold particles can be fired into the surface of black glass, burnished, and then a clear glass layer with a similar expansion fused (a bonding process called slumping) on top of this image. Such a process permanently embeds the photographic image underneath a fused transparent glass cover layer.
This results in a finely detailed photoceramic image that may be as permanently protected that archivally rivals what it is possible to achieve with other technology. The protective glass cover layer could be re-polished to reveal the embedded image in its original state if the photoceramic surface should ever become corroded or damaged over time.
Some examples of photoceramic technology that I experimented with, mostly in the 1970s, are permanently retained under my name in the well-known History of Photography collection in the Humanities Research Center at the University of Texas at Austin.
Roger Baker, Austin
August 4th, 2008 at 5:07 am
[…] discussions have been surfacing around the web. Ed Burtynsky’s proposal to establish a permanent gallery in the 10,000-Year Clock in Nevada asks what a long perspective of human artistic endeavor would […]
August 10th, 2008 at 10:06 am
I’ve been following these blogs for weeks and feel compelled now to make a few clarifications. The photograph, colour separations, and pigment films presented at the seminar on July 23rd were not the work of Edward Burytynsky, as everyone in the blogs and at the seminar seem to assume, but of my husband, John Bladen Bentley who is one of only three artists who have done the exhaustive and intensive research and development to resurrect the colour carbon transfer print.
The discussion has been focussed on permanence, which, of course is the nature of the discussion of the Long Now Foundation. However, in addition to their permanence, these pigments (not inks) have been especially chosen for their colour fidelity. Colour carbon transfer prints have a language unparalleled in any other printmaking process. These prints have the longest tonal scale, highest resolution, colour fidelity and the largest colour palette — John Bentley and Tod Gangler, in Seattle, can print colours unavailable to any other print makers. As well, to promote their longevity, these prints are unaffected by humidity and pollutants in the air.
Some writers seem outraged at the notion of the exploitation of the magenta stone in the process of making colour carbon prints. These pigments have been developed and mined for the auto paint industry. One could reasonably argue that we shouldn’t be exploiting the resources of our planet for such purpose but the reality is that for those writers that drive cars, I’m certain they wouldn’t want their paint jobs to fade in a matter of months. The use by less than a handful of artists is minimal: to make 16 sheets of magenta film uses 18 grams of pigment. And I would think their use in the production of art is a far more worthy purpose.
August 14th, 2008 at 9:07 am
[…] Ed Burtynsky found a way to make photo prints last for 10,000 […]
August 19th, 2008 at 5:48 pm
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August 20th, 2008 at 8:51 pm
What about *transparent* colors? I get the impression that carbon transfer prints as well as the photoceramic prints described in Roger Baker’s post are intended for opaque fields of color on an opaque ground. But suppose an artist wants to create an image with the transparent luminosity of stained glass, to be backlit, yet also possessing a highly controlled and subtle tonal range, as in a painting or a photograph? Mr. Baker describes pigment being laid on a base of black glass, then covered with transparent glass which is fused by slumping onto the image and said base. Would it be possible to use the same process, but sandwich the image between two layers of transparent glass, and producing it in transparent or translucent colors? Permanence being a sine qua non.
A separate question: in another post I suggested the possibility of archiving the contents of the great museums of the world, meaning works of visual art. Is this idea in contemplation for the Long Now project?
Returning to image permanence: I have read that Egyptian wall murals which have endured for thousands of years are painted in watercolor, and that you can easily damage one by dragging a wet finger across a tomb wall. I suppose the colors are probably derived from mineral sources, and hence non-biodegradable. I also distinctly remember seeing a photo in an art book of an ancient Greek drawing done on a slab of marble. I’m not sure of the drawing medium - possibly charcoal? As in the caves at Lascaux.
September 20th, 2008 at 7:56 am
[…] the The Long Now Blog Stewart Brand writes about Edward Burtynsky’s proposal for a 10 000 year art gallery in the […]