Focusing on photographs and prints produced with historical techniques, 1851.gallery is opening its doors with a valuable project consisting of platinum-palladium prints. Photographs by Avni Lifij, painter of the 1914 Generation, are revealed for the first time in a specially curated exhibition, a century after they were taken.
36 glass negatives preserved in the Sirel family collection have been meticulously crafted by 1851.studio over a six-month period using the platinum-palladium printing process, a leading technique of their time.
Curated by Dr. Necmi Sönmez, the exhibition consists of photographs taken by Avni Lifij in Istanbul in the 1900s and later in Ankara in the 1920s. Documenting the living and working conditions of artists known as the 1914 Generation, these photographs underline Avni Lifij's unique position in the yet-to-be-written history of Turkish art. This is because painters such as Zeki Faik İzer and Burhan Doğançay in particular, who were actively engaged in photography themselves, advocated for a multi-layered visual language that questioned reality.
The exhibition positions Avni Lifij, pioneering member of the generation of painter- photographers and advocate of modernism, at the center of a broad inquiry.
Did Lifij make these photographs as tool for, or goal to his art?
About Platinum-Palladium Printing Technique
After years of research, English inventor William Willis (1841-1923) succeeded in creating an image with pure platinum molecules on paper in 1873 and patented his invention right away. Working on his invention, Willis made his technique more practical and accessible by founding the Platinotype company to sell ready-to-use photographic paper.
The platinum printing technique gained rapid popularity due to not only its unprecedented aesthetics characterized by a wide tonal range and smooth gradations achieved through pure platinum molecules penetrating the paper's fibers, but also its durability contributing to its widespread adoption.
Having reached it’s peak of popularity during the Pictorialism movement, the use of this technique declined during World War I due to the war industry's heavy use of platinum causing a significant price increase.
Although the use of palladium over platinum became widespread during the war period, the closure of companies producing ready-to-use paper, particularly Platinotype, and the emergence of much more economical and practical silver-based ready-made papers which also allowed enlargement of the image, caused the platinum-palladium technique to almost fall into oblivion. Revived by a modest interest in historical and handmade techniques in the late 1970s, this technique was brought back into the spotlight by artists such as Irving Penn (1917-2009) and Dick Arentz (1935) who made extensive use of it. Since there are no companies manufacturing ready-to-use platinum-palladium paper today, rare photographers who work like chemists are forced to prepare their own papers and solutions.