Value and Price of Photography.

   © Guillermo Labarca

“Only a fool confuses value and price,” says Antonio Machado, resuming Quevedo. Aristotle already distinguished both concepts, but today, both in photography and in so many areas, there is a tendency to eliminate value and keep only the price, replacing qualities, virtues, convictions, interests, etc.

To clarify: the price of something (in this case photography and also engraving) is set by the market, the mechanisms and their deviations are known to economists; Value is something more complex, it depends on wills, appreciations, emotional effects or knowledge, which have a high level of subjectivity. If we stop at a photograph of a well-known author, let's say Ansel Adams or Koudelka (which I like more) or whoever. Schematically, the price of their photographs will be determined by the quantity available and the willingness of buyers to buy, as well as the expertise of their commercial representatives in setting a price.

The value of the same photo will depend on the image's capacity to transmit emotions, information, to reveal truths about reality and, at the same time, the maturity of those who see it to understand, read, and receive the message. The value of the photo does not depend on the number of copies available, the same goes for the engravings. One of the qualities of photography is its reproducibility; a very high number of copies can be made, all identical, before the negative, the engraving plate or even the original file deteriorates. Each of the copies obtained, if the procedures and materials are maintained, are equivalent and, consequently, transmit the same message. This is something that facilitates the dissemination of the values ​​expressed by the image and makes it available to many people, but makes it difficult for the authors to make a living selling photos. This quality lowers prices if many copies of each image are made. For this reason, both photographers and engraving artists restrict the number of copies to achieve higher prices.

Throughout history one of the characteristics of works of art was that they were unique, there was only one copy of each one, hence there was no distortion between value and price, since engraving introduced a variation when opening the possibility of its reproduction in large quantities, a quality that has existed in photography since its inception. When photographers restrict the number of copies, they try to ensure that the photographs acquire that quality of being unique pieces or at least very rare. This strategy is legitimate for those who want to make a living from photography, but it creates a problem and that is attributing to images a value derived from their price.

Without considering commercial photographs, such as those commissioned by advertising, fashion or others made to order, art buyers, which is true for photography buyers, consider the current and future price of the works. They hope that what they are buying now will generate added value over time. In this way, the value of a photograph or rather, of its author is confused with the prices it obtains. Which is what is happening, also, with other artistic expressions.

This leads us to wonder what would happen if techniques for reproducing objects in three dimensions were developed that would allow us to make Vermeers or Giocondas indistinguishable from the originals? (And it seems we are not far from it.) That is, if the quality of a work of art is not based in the fact that it is unique but in its message? We don't know what may happen, but if it contributes to separating price and value of art, we welcome it.