Digital BW, The Print

salongo lee wrote:
> Hello,  I know that this is slightly off topic.
>    
>   
> Why would an artist be an idiot for destroying the original file of the LE?. Print makers do it all the time after the edition is printed and there peers don't feel they're idiots. 
Print makers do this typically because the master is "used up." For 
example, the wax is worn down and they aren't getting a good impression 
any longer. In other words, there is no point in saving the master since 
one can no longer make quality prints from it. In the case of stone 
lithography, the stones could be scraped, resurfaced, and reused, which 
saved the printer a fair amount of money.

Artists' proofs were just that - proof that the printing process was 
making acceptable quality prints. The edition ran as long as prints of 
acceptable quality could be made -- that is, prints that matched the 
artist's proof were still being made.

None of this -- NONE OF THIS -- translates to photography. The master 
isn't worn out, neither can the master be scraped and reused (unless you 
are using glass plates ;-). The size of an edition isn't set by the 
durability of the plates and the skills of the printmaker, but instead 
is a number pulled out of the air by a marketeer.

Now I'm not going to say that anyone is an idiot. If someone wants to 
limit  printing for whatever reason, one should feel free to do so. If 
someone wants to destroy their film, again, they should feel free to do 
so. But one must understand when one does it, one is making an arbitrary 
choice. No one can argue that "it's tradition" or "we've always done it 
this way" because it isn't, and we haven't.
--
Bruce Watson