Attalea Compta & Prickly Ita (Mauritia Armata) Palm Trees Collotype Print Poster

Vintage Botanical Illustration by Carl Friedrich Philipp von Martius c.1820s Collotype Print from Black Box Collotype in Chicago Brand new print of vintage stock from Black Box Collotype 21.25" x 26" Regular prints at this size retail for $70. "Black Box Collotype" refers to a specific, now-defunct, fine art printing studio in Chicago that specialized in the collotype process, a continuous-tone, screenless photomechanical method used to create high-fidelity, photographic-quality prints. Founded by master printer Michael Intrator, Black Box Collotype closed in 2004 but produced some of the world's finest collotypes for decades, renowned for their delicate tonal gradations. What the Name Means: Black Box: The studio's name, not related to the aircraft recorder. It likely refers to the sophisticated, intricate, and somewhat mysterious nature of the high-end printing process they mastered. Collotype: A highly respected, complex, and time-consuming printing technique that uses a reticulated (crinkled) gelatin layer on a plate to hold ink, resulting in a print with smooth, continuous tones rather than halftone dots.