Old Judge Proofs?

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Posted By: warshawlaw

So I am a perfect candidate for the "jury" on this. Tabula rasa (blank slate) so to speak. Here are my reactions:

If AM knew the checkered history of these photos, AM absolutely had to disclose it. I would be very pissed off if I bought a vintage photo on a modern board and the seller knew that the item had been cut down, peeled, remounted, etc.

I simply cannot believe that altering the item by removing it from its existing old mount and remounting it on new board would not alter the value of the item. Apples ain't oranges (to steal a phrase): I cannot believe that a vintage period piece is worth the same as a piece that is partly vintage and party contemporary. Watch Antiques Roadshow; when you restore an antique, you affect its value (and no, I am not talking about cleaning it, de-acidifying it, etc., although that too can affect value).

I do not believe that peeling the photos and remounting them is an appropriate means of conservation framing for these photos and that leads me to believe that the current condition should be disclosed in full. I spent a great deal of my misguided youth working as a framer. No museum would EVER chop down a mounted piece, peel it, and remount the image. At most, they would place the pieces of paper between plexi or mylar or glass and store it that way in a "sandwich". What happened to these images is simply unprofessional.