PARIS.- Galerie Argentic is exhibiting a series of hand-retouched press photographs from director Raynal Pellicer’s collection. The exhibition runs from 3 April to 20 June 2015. Gathered over the course of several years’ research, Raynal Pellicer’s collection brings together around a hundred photographs which have all been carefully selected for their aesthetic qualities and sheer rarity. This collection - the only one of its kind - was exhibited in 2013 during the Rencontres Photographie in Arles. The exhibition was a resounding success and gave rise to a book entitled Version Originale , published by Editions de La Martinière.

The Galerie Argentic exhibition focuses on around thirty iconic works featuring a range of personalities who will be sure to stir visitors’ memories of the silver screen. This exhibition, La Fabrique des Icônes ( The Idol Factory ), revolves around an examination of the very concept of images. We are shown how a portrait or a still from a film which at first sight may seem perfectly ordinary, may have been cropped, cut, painted and ultimately changed so much so as to communicate a meaning that is entirely different to that which it initially had. It has become an entirely different image, where all that remains is the person in question – a truer likeness, a more beautiful, more photogenic version of that person.

Retouching in press photography: a hedonistic view of the world?
These press photographs date from 1910 through to 1970. They demonstrate retouching, is a subject that remains a burning issue to this day, has been around since well before digital camera technology came to dominate the editing process. Then, the tools of the trade were gouache and paint. Photographs were cropped and painted upon, unwanted details hidden and additions made, making each photograph a one-off. Whether we’re talking about photographs that have been visibly retouched by hand or by modern-day ‘ Photoshopping’ , the end objective remains the same: to improve on the image and its content, allowing the reader access to a preselected, ideal image.

Humphrey Bogart’s cigarette was already deemed inappropriate as early as 1949 – it was destined to be covered over by grey paint. The same fate awaited the curls of cigarette smoke, leaving the onlooker with just the piercing gaze of the American actor, with all his flaws smoothed away. Ginger Rogers, Rudy Dusek, Robert Stack, Clark Gable, Charlie Chaplin… all of these figures desired to project an absolutely perfect public image.

At the same time, retouching has always been with us. Transmitting the correct message in an aestheticallypleasing package is an end in itself which may involve editing ‘unwelcome’ details. Whether a Neanderthal man in his cave, correcting the drawing of an animal with his ochre pigment, or Charles Le Brun redrafting a hand or the fold of a drapery on the ceilings of the Hall of Mirrors in Versailles, for centuries the key aim of this practice has been that of persuasion and the communication of the right message at the right time.

Retouching, at what price? Limits and codes of practice
Retouching inevitably raises questions about ethics and codes of practice, the raison d’être of images and the role played by retouching in the contemporary news media. Why do we retouch images? Why are our idols and celebrities not portrayed as they really are? A recent unretouched photograph of Cindy Crawford which has surfaced online provides an explanation - wrinkles, imperfections, signs of ageing - in fact, all perfectly normal features which are usually looked down on by hollywood and the media. So, who’s behind all of this?

World Press Photo keeps an eye out for photo manipulation and other kinds of fakery, especially in documentary photography and photojournalism, fields where each image acquires great symbolism and significance for those viewing it. However, retouching now appears to be everywhere, making it difficult to untangle what is genuine from what is not.

Photographic retouching, or the hidden side of images
These retouched press photographs enable us to see the process and the methods by which we can take an image and use it to communicate a message that is perfectly-calibrated and in fact, completely ‘on-message’. They also show us the hidden side of press photography, permitting us to understand how a supposedly ordinary image can hold more than meets the eye.