Michal Macku - WB 1

 

GELLAGE

Since the end of 1989, Michal Macku has used his own creative technique which he has named "Gellage" (the ligature of collage and gelatin).

The technique consists of transfer the exposed and fixed photographic emulsion from its original base on paper. This transparent and plastic gelatin substance makes it possible to reshape and reform the original images, changing their relationships and endowing them with new meanings during the transfer. The finished work gives a compact image with a fine surface structure. Created on photographic quality paper, each Gellage is a highly durable print eminently suited for collecting and exhibiting.

The laborious technology, which often includes the use of more than one negative per image, makes it impossible to produce absolutely identical prints: Each Gellage is an original work of art. The artist does make at least 12 signed and numbered prints of each image.

Michal Macku talks about his work: "I use the nude human body (mostly my own) in my pictures. Through the photographic process [of Gellage], this concrete human body is compelled to meet with abstract surroundings and distortions. This connection is most exciting for me and helps me to find new levels of humanness in the resulting work.
I am always seeking new means of expression and, step by step, I am discovering almost unlimited possibilities through my work with loosened gelatin. Photographic pictures mean specific touch with concrete reality for me, one captured level of real time. The technique of Gellage which I am using helps me to take one of these "time sheets" and release a figure, a human body, from it, causing it to depend on time again. Its charm is similar to that of cartoon animation, but it is not a trick. It is very important for me to be aware of the history of a picture and to have a sense of direct contact with its reality. My work places "body pictures" in new situations, new contexts, new realities, causing their "authentic" reality to become relative. I am interested in questions of moral and inner freedom. I do what I feel, and only then do I begin to meditate on what the result is. I am often surprised by the new connections I find in it. Naturally, I start out with a concrete intention, but the result is often very different. And there, I believe, lies a hitch. One creates to communicate what can not be expressed in any other way. Then comes the need to describe, to define."

CARBON PRINTS

Since 2000 Macku uses also other historical photographic techniques in combination with the technique GELLAGE. After experiments with heliogravure, platinum and kallitype he mastered technique of carbon printing. He was provided for working with original negatives of a real master of this technique and one of the legend of Czech photography - worldwide well known photographer Frantisek Drtikol.

The carbon prints are sized approx. 35x30 cm (14x12''), on a top quality graphic watermark paper, stamped and signed and the edition of each motif is limited to 24 numbered copies.

About the CARBON technique
Text from book called: The Book of Carbon and Carbro: Contemporary Procedures for Monochrome Pigment Printmaking. For more information contact author: Sandy King

In versatility and range of possibilities, carbon is a superb process. It is capable of presenting images with a wide range of image characteristics, of virtually any color or tone, and on a wide variety of surfaces. During the entire period of its history when it co-existed with other commercial processes in the second half of 19th century, carbon was considered the aristocrat of printing processes. Carbon prints were more costly than those produced by other processes, about twice as expensive as platinum and three to five times as much as silver. On the other hand, the technique is very difficult to work. But once mastered, carbon process offers a range of possibilities not available with any other photographic system, and difficult to, if not impossible, to duplicate.

The carbon process, like all pigment processes depends upon the fact that colloids (gelatin, gum, albumen, casein etc.), when applied to a suitable support, sensitized with a dichromate salt and activated by exposure to light change their physical characteristics in proportion to the intensity of the chemical or light. The process, called tanning or hardening, makes the colloid insoluble in hot water.

Carbon prints can be made to look virtually indistinguishable from silver prints. Because of their discernible relief, carbon images often have greater apparent sharpness than of silver prints. The archival qualities of carbon prints are superior to those derived from silver salt papers. The stability of carbon is limited only by the gelatin carrier and its paper base, making it the most stable of all photographic processes.

Commercial Carbon Printing: Please contact Michal Macku for more information about commercial carbon printing for museums, collectors, photographers and artists He uses to work with both vintage and contemporary negatives. There is also available retouching and renovation broken glass negatives and vintage prints.