Film and Development Tests, 1955-1984 and undated

Scope and content:

This series has its origins in Gedney's lifelong study of the chemistry and composition of black-and-white darkroom photography. He experimented constantly with different film, papers, exposures, and developers, keeping meticulous notes on his findings. This work resulted in the hundreds of large and small prints found in this series. Most of the larger prints measure 11x14 inches, and the rest are chiefly 8x10 inches. In addition to the prints, the series also contains Gedney's original files for articles on photography, product inserts, and manuscript notebooks filled with details on various experiments over the years, as well as lists of equipment, cameras, and film that Gedney used. The materials are divided into two divisions for the papers and the test prints, which are each arranged by folder title, in alphabetical order. The many negatives associated with this work are found in the Negatives Series.

Test print subjects in this series are often not found elsewhere in the bodies of work: these include Brooklyn scenes of rooftops, yards, and streets, still lifes, portraits of close friend Anita Lobel, images of Gedney in his apartment, and a series of prints taken at the Tryon family's dairy farm near his grandparents' own farm (the Tryons were relatives of the Gedney family). Other test prints were developed from frames in already-established series; for example, there are test prints of Brooklyn Bridge, Summer Stock, Paris, India, and Kentucky images. Of interest is an extensive sequence of camera shots taken from Gedney's apartment window on Myrtle Avenue; there are only a few prints in this series, but in the Contacts Series there are many dozens of contact sheets documenting this work. These sequences tested types of light according to the time of day, effects of weather such as snow and rain, and so on. The contact sheets are neatly labeled with the date, time of day, and often record the temperature in the apartment at the time. While away in India, Gedney hired a building tenant to continue this work, taking photographs at prescribed times from a camera that Gedney had fixed into place.

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