Carbon Ink Prints

Carbon Ink Prints are photographs made with a modern inkjet method which uses carbon based inks and acid-free archival papers. It is a modern technology with links to the past, as carbon was the first substance used successfully to create long lasting photographic prints. The first Carbon Print process was developed in France in 1856. Carbon Printing in various forms is still practiced today by people who love to keep the old processes alive.

Modern Carbon Ink prints have been age tested at over 100 years under display conditions without significant fading, with projections for much longer periods in archival dark storage conditions, such as in scrapbooks or slipcased portfolios made with acid-free materials. Accelerated age testing is still an imperfect science, so we can't predict with certainty the upper limits of longevity. However, ancient manuscripts over 1000 years old that used carbon ink on flax paper can be seen in museums today.

Carbon Ink prints come full circle with the past in another interesting way. Because it is an ink on paper process, it is related to Photogravure, an ink based photographic method the origins of which go back to the early days of photography.

Alfred Stieglitz, an influential photographer and force behind the acceptance of photography as an art form during the early 1900's, also promoted photogravures as "artistic objects in their own right". He included tipped-in photogravures in the journal "Camera Notes" and also sold them as individual prints and portfolios (from Alfred Stieglitz's Camera Notes, by Christian A. Peterson, pages 33-41).

Ink based photographic prints are well established as works of art and have a long and distinguished history. You can spend enormous amounts of money buying one of those original Camera Notes editions, and the photogravures of Edward Sherrif Curtis and others bring high prices at auctions.

The modern Carbon Ink Print is a unique blend of old and new technologies.