Why I’m Starting a Print Shop
Why would a commercial photographer open a print shop? Why do you want to sell limited numbers of your prints? Why don’t you just do NFT’s?
I like many photographers have heard the Siren call of the NFT hype but what does that have to do with a print shop? Well let me tell ya.
I’ve always had an appreciation and an artistic leaning to analog processes within photography. In college, my favorite class was solely focused on learning and mastering alternative photographic processes….I took it I think 3 times? I’m sure my professor loved that. 🤪 In high school, I was required to take film courses before I could take the digital class. Initially I was annoyed, (I’m sure that comes as a shock to anyone who knows me now) but quickly felt more drawn to film than to digital. I find these analog processes more meditative & intentional where others find them annoying & laborious. But what does that have to do with NFT’s?
Please no one come for me but NFT’s are ummmm just a jpg. Don’t lecture me please I get it, it’s the only one in the world, it exists in web 3, it’s the future of our world, THE METAVERSE, Crypto bro have you invested? What about if someone f****** screenshots it? Before some one also says well jpgs are art too! I totally agree. JPG’s are art. But are NFT’s worth abandoning other physical, analog processes?
I feel like this is a discussion in the photographic community, pretty much anytime a “new technology” comes around. Should we abandon the old tech and fully embrace the new? It may not be discussed as blatantly as this, and it’s also worth noting that newer technologies (such as the iPhone, and NFT’s) typically have a lower cost of entry, making photography much more accessible to low-income communities. Artists also can start to look down their nose at those who use cheaper methods to create art. We’ve all seen the meme of the old guy who takes a picture of one thing with a 4x5 film camera and a girl who takes a photo of the same thing with an iPhone and one is considered “museum worthy”. This is a discussion for a completely different day but I do think it’s an important exercise to do with yourself while photographing.
Back to NFT’s and my prints. I like the idea of having something that has limited editions but I don’t like the idea of having that thing be only something that lives in the Metaverse or my computer. So I settled on a “Physical NFT” lol or a limited edition Archival Print. No this isn’t an archival historic process (yet). Some of the imagery in the drops will undoubtedly be on film & some will be digital, but all will be living in our physical world and not easily replicable by a screenshot. Am I doing this as a sort of middle finger to the whole NFT thing? Not necessarily, but I do think it’s important to keep making tangible, tactile art in a world that seems to be increasingly online.
Printed art adds personality to a space. For instance, I remember in my childhood bedroom I shared with my sister, both of us had the scholastic book fair posters of different dogs. I really was a rebel kid. In my home right now I have a cyanotype of a plant I may have stolen from my husband and I’s first apartment complex. Not quite as good as the dog poster, but every time I look at it I’m reminded of all the memories we have there. We also have a big print of the mountain I took on a 4x5. Nothing is particularly great about these mountains but I love to spend time outside whenever I can. I feel so much peace hiking and skiing. Starring at that massive print helps remind me that life isn’t as chaotic as the 9-5 and that soon, God willing, I’ll be not writing blog posts, but in the mountains.
