Once upon a time the collotype

• As you will understand from the title of this article, we will have to talk about the past (or almost). This process, which dominated for fifty years, was the locomotive that drove all modern printing. On this point alone it deserves our full consideration. His direct descendants, zincography, rotogravure, and especially offset (eg roto-calcography) which will benefit from the immense progress made in the inks, the papers, the frames and the current perfection of the pre-sensitized plates allowing short runs and good quality, will overcome the photomechanical ancestor. What enthusiast, connoisseur or informed bibliophile would not be moved by these works of the past to such perfect photographic illustrations? Reproductions of drawings, with pen or pencil, wash, engravings on copper, facsimiles of manuscripts where one finds even full and untied the writing of the time. These are certainly impressions in collotype. The use of a wire count to check the absence of frame can confirm the fact.

• The first known editions including non-texts and sometimes in-texts (these are more rarely reproduced in collotype) are albums or books about travel and tourism, whose texts are printed in typography, the margins being often enriched with superb vignettes very popular in this period. For the history of the process, it is necessary to start from the discoveries of the lithography in 1796, and the photography in 1829. It will be necessary to wait for the years 1854/1855 so that the work of the engineer Poitevin on the properties of the gelatine sensitized to the dichromate, after its exposure to light, open by the development of the phototypy the outbreak of the era of the printed photographic image. Associating the lithographic principle, that every dry surface (lovingly) receives the greasy ink, and that any moist surface repels this same greasy ink, the inking of the only parts exposed to the light of a dichromated gelatin thus becomes possible, the parts more or less insolated remaining more or less wet. The negative is exposed against the plate coated with the dichromated preparation, this plate is then rinsed to eliminate its sensitization, and then dried and rewetted with a diluted glycerin which is a much more permanent wetting agent than water. This wetting is automatically proportional to the amount of light received through the negative, and it is distributed from black to white, through the entire range of gray! It’s done: we can PRINT photography! Following the discovery of Poitevin, many known and anonymous researchers participated in the culmination of the collotype in its final phase.

• After having tried in the first way, as support for the emulsion, the lithographic stone, then the copper, the zinc, the aluminum, the use of a slab of glass of ten to fifteen millimeters thick turns out to be the ideal solution clean, flat, easy to reuse, where the image is well legible with a white sheet underneath. At the end of the 19th century, machine manufacturers, notably Voirin (in France), offered small size presses, 15cm x 21cm or 30cm x 40cm with all the necessary paraphernalia, slabs, products, chassis-press, oven to prepare and dry the plates that will be used to print. All this aimed especially at a clientele of knowledgeable amateurs who will thus be able, with the user manual supplied with the material, to draw personalized proofs from their own negatives. Some even equipped, in addition to small printing presses called “punch” to add legends, publish postcards of their locality. Maybe they are the origin of the name “Printer room”? Moreover, the points in common with the lithography will lead to use the same materials. The litho press with cylinder and margin to hand, hardly modified will do the job. The removal of the wetting table and its replacement by a second inking table fed by grain leather rollers will generously fill the blacks (which are recessed) of the phototype image. The original inking table will be equipped with gelatin rolls that will soften and refine the quality of the test in its innumerable semitones. A balance system will allow the cylinder to rotate once for two round trips of the carriage, thus doubling the inking, which will bring an exceptional quality of the rendering of the print.

• It is from the 1890s that builders like Alauzet, Faber (who will become Roland), Voirin, Marinoni, Albert, etc … begin to produce these machines. Hundreds of presses will soon be in service. The process is fast and economical. There is a certain craze, orders are flocking from all sides. It’s the only way to print reality. Manufacturers, small manufacturers are fond of catalogs faithfully reproducing their products. There are also exhibition plaques, portrait albums, diplomas, fashion, cinema, but it is especially with the advent of the illustrated postcard that the collotype will know its age of gold. We even print cards called “news” an event, a news item, the parade of Mardi Gras in Paris … and the card is on sale the next day! We are at the time when the postcard replaces the still stammering phone. Your cousin Orleans writes you the day before to announce you “To-morrow evening, as agreed”. And it works! -with stamps confirming the departure time and arrival time of the message.

• In addition to the “cartepostaliers”, other workshops are devoted to more artistic works. We can not forget all these books called “semi-luxury”, featuring reproductions on colors of very good quality. This is from below drawn collotype, then stained with stencil, a process that happens to be the ancestor of modern screen printing. From the original, we print a proof, usually in black, which will be the base, the subtle shade, keeping the accents, the structure, and reserving the beaches with the most subtle colorations. Then in windows identified and cut in a thin metal sheet, the coloring with watercolor or gouache (more or less diluted) is done manually. Famous facsimiles have been made by this good fusion of the two techniques.

• In the same spirit of association of processes, we must also mention the happy marriage between the collotype and its setting on colors by lithography with translucent or semi-translucent inks, letting appear or transparency the values given by the first pass. This method has mainly been used for prints, museum posters, as well as for some art books in the first half of the century.

• Note that despite the difficulties inherent in the very principle of collotype, some fans have dared to tackle printing on trichromatic and four-color process, and this with results often to leave stunned more than a wise connoisseur.

• Entering the workshops was at the time a great privilege, the printers keeping their secrets jealously; in addition to respectable people, many had the silver-headed cane … (even if they were valid!).

• It will remain in the memory of all those who participated or attended the sessions of the “good to shoot” the intense atmosphere of these moments, which are the culmination of a team work, and where everyone will find themselves concerned. First the “client”, artist or publisher, then the photographer, the retoucher, the editor, the preparer and the insolator of the plate, to the hands of the -conductor photo- as it was called in workshops where he rubbed lithos and typos. At the end of the chain, he will become the conductor, and this, in a climate and smells of alchemy. After stalling and starting his board – about four hours, he presents a test that will be appreciated or contested, and that he can still modify and even transform widely. He will make these changes of tones of the test by humidifying or drying some parts of the image locally using different preparations administered in the gelatin, fine brush, cotton. with a sponge or even a finger. Also by varying the speed of the press, accelerating or slowing down under the passage of the rollers, by changing the consistency of the ink, which is manually deposited with the knife on the distributor roller.

• Perhaps we will still seek to improve the test? Could we not be a little more nervous, or calmer, cooler, or softer, quieter, etc. Expressions used during these sessions. And this until the famous “good to shoot” that will serve as a guide for the follow-up of the draw. It will be preserved and may serve as “justice of the peace” in case of dispute. Customized work, great crafts!

• Finally, it was not uncommon, always in search of the ultimate, saris offset the plate, so in perfect registration, that we proceed to iron with a neutral tone, hot or cold, ink very down , called sub-tint, this to further enrich the-beautiful-image. In addition, there is a possibility of using the original process, the artist drawing on the dry layer, then we wet and print that’s all. This without any other foreign manipulation. Also engraving on a scratch-resistant medium, we obtain a negative image that will be reported on the plate and also printed live. This way of doing things has been widely used, successfully by many illustrators.

• The collotype almost forgotten today, does not finish dying. After the recent closures of the printing houses in Vienna and London, there are still three workshops in Paris still practicing the “fine craft”. One is dedicated primarily to satisfy contemporary artists and photographers. the other especially to scientific works and reproductions of high quality. In Japan, we still practice in Tokyo and Kyoto, in a slightly different way. We print as many passages of subtle small gray as it takes to reach the desired result. The prints are made on Japanese presses resembling old lithographic machines with snowshoe reception.

• In addition, do not doubt that there are still some enthusiasts in the world who take their tests in their apartment, pressing them with a spoon!

• In 1970, a meeting of German and Swiss printers at Kassel, tried to better “recognize” this process which would be well suited, by the modest cost price of the printing plate, the prints of 100 to 2000 copies. But for this multiple craft, as one could designate it, the circumstances have since evolved very well. The range of 100 to 200 copies may be the best strategy for the future. A print of this high quality on a very good paper can be concluded in the day, avoiding a restart the next day, often delicate and harmful to the good cash of the company. What is happening today, the introduction of electronics throughout the printing industry, photocopiers that are advancing by leaps and bounds, suggest new directions. But for the lovers of the printed thing, the only criterion of judgment should always be, without prejudice of the mode of impression the only delight of the eye. Many artists know it well and without a priori willingly participate with all the old and recent techniques.

• Let us conclude with those who still practice with great tenacity the old profession of phototyper to pursue and find the way and the partners they deserve!

Roland MOTTAY