Modelling States of Prints using FRBRoo

Definition of Print (visual works) from the Art and Architecture Thesaurus (AAT): “Pictorial works produced by transferring images by means of a matrix such as a plate, block, or screen, using any of various printing processes.” Thus a print is a visual work, created through a wide range of techniques that involve making an ink impression on paper or other material (etc.) based on a matrix or plate which creates the image. Many techniques for preparing the matrix or plates and striking the prints exist.

The plates are usually intended to be used multiple times to produce multiple, essentially identical, copies of the print. This fits with the definition of an industrial process. In FRBRoo this concept applies to any system of production that can create objects in a series, including small-scale production processes; it is not restricted to large factory production.

In the simple case, the modelling of prints using FRBRoo is exactly parallel to the creation of any other F3 Manifestation Product Type:

F32 Carrier Production Event R26 produced things of type F3 Manifestation Product Type.

The use of a specific plate (E24 Physical Man-Made Thing) can be modelled with the addition of P16 used specific object. The creator is modelled with an E39 Actor linked to the F27 Work Conception and to the F28 Expression Creation, producing an F22 Self-contained Expression, and possibly a different E39 Actor linked to the actual printing via F32 Carrier Production Event R28 produced F54 Utilized Information Carrier. The individual prints are instances of F5 Item.

At various stages during the production of the matrix or plate, prints (proofs) may be taken by the printmaker to ascertain the evolution of the image. (This is because it can be difficult to gauge the printed result merely from viewing the matrix.) In the course of the print run, or prior to starting a new print run which reuses the same physical plate, alterations may be deliberately introduced, either by the original creator or by someone else, on the plate (adding details or modifying part of the image) which produces variants or states of the print. Each proof, or set of proofs, documenting an intentional alteration of the matrix or plate defines a distinct state. This is a deliberate process, not merely the normal wear of the plate through repeated use (which might result in later copies being less crisp, for instance, than those produced at the beginning of the print run).

In the Descriptive Cataloging of Rare Materials (Graphic materials) (DCRM(G)), a “state” is defined as follows:

“In graphic usage, an impression or set of identical impressions produced from a plate or other matrix at a distinct, visually identifiable stage in the life of that matrix due to intentional changes to the matrix, and often marking a point in its artistic development (such as “etched state” or a “state after letters”).”

In FRBRoo the process of creating a state can be modelled using an E39 Actor linked to E81 Transformation P124 transformed E24 Physical Man-Made Thing (subclass of E77 Persistent Item) (the plate). The instance of E39 Actor may or may not be the same as the one responsible for the original work creation, etc. This transformation event happened at a given time, then the production of F3 Manifestation Product Type after this time is a new instance of F3, so the F5 Items produced using the modified plate are items of this later manifestation, which embodies a new expression of the F1 Work, derived from the previous F22 Self-contained expression.

This is analogous to the situation of the production of books by hand-press printing. Once the type was composed and the printing process started, states within that impression could be obtained when more or less minor changes were made to the type in the course of printing. Some of these variations can be significant and result in variant manifestations, or even variant expressions.

(For more details on states of early printed books see: Jonsson, Gunilla. Cataloguing of hand press materials and the concept of Expression in FRBR. In: Functional Requirements for Bibliographic Records (FRBR) : hype or cure-all? Patrick Le Boeuf (editor). Haworth Information Press,  2005, pp.77-86).