Here's a word to the wise for all you photo collectors and would-be photo collectors out there. I had a nice long talk with a TOP reader named Rodger Kingston recently. Rodger's a fine photographer in his own right, and he's had a long, multi-part, multi-path career in photography. In the 1970s, he owned a photography gallery that specialized in 19th-century prints. He wasn't able to afford for himself much of the better work he handled, but he did start collecting the "little things" that came into his hands—the odds and ends that didn't have a ready market and seemed to him to need a home.
Well, lo and behold, several decades later, his by-now extensive collection of between-the-cracks stuff constitutes a major collection. What he once called "junk" is now called "vernacular photography," and the collection as a whole recently appraised for—hold on to your hat—$4.3 million! What started out as a labor of love and enthusiasm turned into a pretty nice retirement plan. (Note: if you're young now, someday you'll be hearing the same thing about collections of prints from the early digital era—now, that would be—even prints not by "name" photographers. Mark my words.)
Shows what you can end up with when you just start collecting what you like, and what you can.
The Kingston Collection is the subject of a new and particularly delightful little book called In the Vernacular: Photography of the Everyday published by Boston University Art Gallery. It's a modestly-sized paperback and not thick, but it's a little treasure-box of photographic riches, giving a good idea of the sweep and variety of the collection as a whole. I haven't read the extensive selection of essays yet, but I'm looking forward to that. The pictures are wonderful—everything from Tom Kelley's Marilyn Monroe pinup in a pirated calendar, to automobile ads, to forensic photographs, to cyanotypes, to photo-booth strips, to stereographs, to lenticular postcards (you know, that magically transform when you change your viewing angle). I have only one complaint, and that is that there isn't enough. I could have looked at three or four times as many. (There are 70 0bjects shown in the book, 175 in the exhibition, and 4,000 in the collection.)
In the Vernacular also has the distinction of being one of the very last—if not the last—book printed at the fabled Stinehour Press in Lunenburg, Vermont, source of so many fine American photo books over the years.
This isn't a major book, but it's a particularly enjoyable minor one. I can't see how it would be out of place in anyone's library, and it surely provides more enjoyment per ounce (and per dollar—only fifteen bucks!) than many weightier tomes.
Gets a strong recommendation from me. I like this kind of thing. I've been through it several times now and I know I'll be back again.
Featured Comment by Stacey McCarroll Cutshaw: "Thank you for the nice piece on Rodger's collection and the 'In the Vernacular' project. Just wanted to let folks know that the book is also available via the Boston University Art Gallery website, and this might solve the problem for your reader in Canada."
(Note: Stacey was Curator and Director of the Boston University Art Gallery until 2007. She co-curated the "In the Vernacular: Everyday Photographs from the Collection of Rodger Kingston" show with Ross Barrett. —Ed.)
Good for Mr. Kingston. I hope his wife never said, "What are you keeping that for? You never throw anything away!"
Every week on Antiques Roadshow there seems to be something very valuable that I never would have thought was worth a dried fig, as the Italians say. I guess things become valuable because they become rare as more and more people say, "Why do I have this old doo-dad?" and then pitch it in the trash.
I was trying to come up with things to collect that are being replaced by newer technology. For example, I bet in the 1970s someone collecting mechanical watches was getting them for a song since quartz watches were more accurate. Now that people are into collecting and crafts they realize the value of mechanical watches and that a few seconds inaccuracy per day is no big deal. I didn't give it much though but the only old technology I could only come up with was old cell phones from the 80s and early 90s. But like many people in the past I said to myself, "Now there's something that people will never collect." We'll see.
Posted by: JonA | Wednesday, 25 March 2009 at 12:32 PM
I'm going to try to get a copy Mike, but, alas, Amazon.ca doesn't list it right now.
As for JonA's interest in "things to collect that are being replaced by newer technology," I was delighted to discover that there are folks who collect late 70's/early 80's scientific electronic calculators. Who knew? I did very well on eBay.
Posted by: latent_image | Wednesday, 25 March 2009 at 04:24 PM
yeah, but is it vintage vernacular?
Posted by: cog | Wednesday, 25 March 2009 at 05:52 PM
Yes, definitely vintage. 1800s and early 1900s, mostly.
Mike
Posted by: Mike Johnston | Wednesday, 25 March 2009 at 06:19 PM
Hearing "young now" and "$4.3 million" has me doing my best to mark Mike's words. Problem is, I'm not exactly sure how! My knowledge of wet darkroom techniques is cursory at best, but my understanding is that the bulk of the things that people used to do in the wet darkroom to produce the final print are now done in Photoshop or a raw converter etc. Therefore the modern (and likely, future) equivalent of a traditional darkroom-produced print is really a digital file which encapsulates all of the photographer's adjustments. From this the photographer can make prints but these prints will be performed in a largely automated way with all of the artistry previously reserved for the wet darkroom having already been performed prior to beginning the printing process. What then, should we be collecting? It seems likely that prints are going to be less and less relevant going forward as the world becomes increasingly digitised -- for example, today's digital photo frames are crude but likely to get bigger and more impressive or have the functionality generally integrated into most display panels. So does this imply that original digital files will become the collectors items instead? This may be particularly relevant given photographers don't tend to make these widely available, leading to a kind of scarcity. However, once the file has obtained, as unlimited copies can now be made, will prints made in the era become sought-after? If so, to what degree are these likely to be purely a reflection on the nature of the printers we currently have available more than anything else? Just some thoughts...
Posted by: Christian | Wednesday, 25 March 2009 at 11:05 PM
Mike,
Thank you for the nice piece on Rodger's collection and the "In the Vernacular" project. Just wanted to let folks know that the book is also available via the Boston University Art Gallery Web site, and this might solve the problem for your reader in Canada. Best -- Stacey
http://www.bu.edu/art/webPages/catalogues.html
Posted by: Stacey McCarroll Cutshaw | Wednesday, 25 March 2009 at 11:15 PM