Bidder Reviews for Woodblock Prints World (56)

Dear Gerard, There are no such thing as a "Bleach detector" (Else I would own one:) but in my experience, here is what you should know: 1/Prints that are bleached lose their thin colors first, such as pink or yellow. This particular print doesn't have any pink originally, but its yellow color is still pretty strong, suggesting it has very unlikely been treated. 2/Certain level of color fading could indeed come from a bleaching process, but also simply from exposure to natural light. The colors in this print are not as strong as when originally printed, but they are definitely not "Washed out" The pictures on the auction are not altered in any way, they reflect exactly what you have received. 3/Prints that are bleached have a uniform white paper, way too white to be 90 years old. If this print was bleached, there would be no matte burn or toning whatsoever, the paper wouldn't have any forms of toning. So when you say: "You should be able to tell immediately when a woodblock print had been treated", the evidence kinda show otherwise. (Maybe it is not as obvious after all) With that being said, the print is indeed nearly 100 years old, so who knows how many collectors owned it over the years. It is possible that the print has been indeed, somehow altered, just like 80 % of the prints you probably own from that period. Yet, I have never seen an auction house stipulating that a print they are listing may have been bleached, even though half of their prints probably are, with or without their knowledge (including most major auction houses...)