Because I’ve been in the photography business for a very long time I’m asked occasionally to evaluate and appraise photography equipment, usually in an Estate Sale situation. I’m not a camera store salesman but, by virtue of time and experience, I know the value of modern digital equipment, film equipment and vintage gear. It’s just a side-effect of being in the business so long.
As professional photographers we spend our entire careers buying, selling and acquiring a lot of equipment. Each piece of equipment is carefully selected, tested against similar gear, often sacrifices are made to get the cash needed to purchase the equipment. For those of my age we did it twice. We managed to acquire and collect everything we thought we needed only for the entire industry to change from film to digital leaving us with obsolete gear, all of which needed to be replaced with digital equipment.
Most of us take care of our equipment so it’s in good condition and reliable (except for some newspaper photographers and other photojournalists who beat the hell out of their gear). Some things are used almost daily while other, more specialized pieces, may only be used once or twice a year. These aren’t toys, they’re tools of the trade, necessary to do our jobs.
We spend our lifetimes creating imagery with this equipment, which now includes computers and software; we may work for fifty years or more, spending thousands of hours in the studio. Then, inevitably, we die. The artist is gone, the edition is closed, but the studio stands, full of valuable, carefully chosen equipment which are no longer the tools of the deceased photographer, but now are commodities, things of perceived value to be exchanged for money.
The photographer is dead. The studio stands silent and before the equipment can even gather dust, the vultures begin circling. This is where I come in. I’m the vulture, come to pick over the remains of some dead photographer’s life. I don’t want to be the vulture, but someone less knowledgeable would likely give the stuff away, unaware and uncaring of its value. I suppose I can’t help but be a vulture, that’s the nature of the ‘Estate Sale.’ Still, I imagine someone going through my stuff after I’m gone and it’s so disconcerting to me that I specified in my Will who gets what. I don’t want the vultures circling my studio.
As an aside, I must mention that in virtually every studio I’ve appraised, I’ve always found more equipment than photographs. Where are their works? Why are there so many image-making supplies, but so few images? It’s like they are camera-collectors first, and photography is secondary. Did they never make prints? If finished photographs are found, it’s often difficult to determine their value and I’m sure many fine images are lost for no reason other than laziness or ignorance. The value of a photograph isn’t always obvious. But cameras? Cameras are obviously valuable even if you know nothing about the make or model. Cameras are high-value things thieves will steal, but photographs, not so much.
The last studio I was called in to appraise belonged to a local photographer. I’d never heard of him and was unaware of his studio, just a few miles from mine. I thought I knew most every local photographer, but this guy was off my radar. His was clearly a working studio with all the lights, backgrounds and other grip equipment strewn about. I learned about his one main client, a gun magazine, and apparently the ‘gun guys’ had already been there and cleaned out all the weaponry. I was told this was done quickly so word wouldn’t get out that there were weapons present that could be stolen as his studio sat empty. This was probably a good thing as guns are valuable and can be used to kill people, unlike cameras which are valuable, but not deadly.
Again, as seems to be the norm, there were very few photographs present. There was a closet with a few framed prints, but that was all. Some computer guys had already been there and collected several hard drives which, I suspect, contained much of his photographic output. But I never saw the photos.
Someone had pulled all the cameras and lenses from their storage spaces, and everything was laid out on tables. There was a lot of equipment and some of it caught my eye immediately making me uncomfortable trying to fight off ‘the vulture’ and nab as much as I could for myself. I worked with a group of people to determine what could be sold on eBay, sold at an Estate Sale, what should be offered to Art Centers and Colleges, etc. I also acquired a few camera bodies, lenses and other ancillary equipment for myself. It was difficult to navigate the razor’s edge between paying too much or too little. I felt guilt grabbing for the absent photographer’s stuff. And the really sad thing was the guy wasn’t even dead yet! He’d gotten dementia and had been moved to a Memory Care Center, no doubt without his knowledge.
I did take some solace in the fact that I’d actually use most of the stuff and it would be in my good hands. Some of the vintage equipment was eventually sold on the collector’s market --hopefully to someone who’d appreciate it, like collectors do.
The remainder was sold off, I’m sure for pennies on the dollar, at an Estate Sale. The family valued the money it would generate, but not the equipment itself, they had no emotional investment, which I found a little sad, but pretty much normal. I don’t think anyone gave a damn about his photography –his life’s work—which I find especially distressing.
But everything is trivial in the face of death.
The photographer was gone; his lifetime collection of equipment was disbursed and diffused among people who never knew him. Hopefully his equipment will contribute to the career of a young, up and coming photographer. Strange. His work was never recognized but his equipment lived on. I hope the old cameras are used by new hands to make new images.
I try to be respectful and honest in these dealings, but I still come away feeling like a vulture.
