Preserving Photographs

With the holidays, particularly Thanksgiving, right around the corner, I cannot help but think of family and tradition at this time of year. Until the New Year, I hope to make posts around this theme. This is just the first of the series.

I came across this post from the Smithsonian Visual Archives blog called "The Bigger Picture" which is updated regularly with images, links and snipets of history. In the post, Nora Lockshin, Paper Conservator at the Smithsonian Institute, describes her mother's project to preserve photographs, those pictorial documents of memories.

Photographs are sensitive objects, especially the older they are, which include daguerreotypes, tintypes, albumen prints, and silver gelatin prints. Typically, the image (created by a variety of materials depending on the kind of print) is suspended in a transparent binder layer (which in turn is made from a choice of materials depending on the process). The image and the binder are both, but individually, sensitive to its environment and each may react differently to it.

Thus, the process to create photographs has changed and developed over time. When photography first became popular in the U.S. in the mid-nineteenth century, daguerreotypes required a light-sensitive silver-plated sheet of copper to be exposed to light and developed over mercury vapor. Nowadays, most photography is digital which requires a whole other set of concerns.

What's important is to know your materials. There is quite a bit of resources out there to aid in preserving photographs. My favorite is Photographs: Archival Care and Management by Mary Lynn Ritzenthaler and Diane Vogt-O'Connor, which appears to be out of print. Check your local public library or museum to see if they have a copy you can review.