• Courtesy G. Gibson Gallery
• Bill Brandt, Northumbrian Miner At His Evening Meal, 1937, gelatin silver print, signed, 11 by 14 inches

This is one of those pictures that doesn't need any commentary. Just look at it.

It's part of an exhibition of classic 20th-century photography at G. Gibson Gallery through February 18.

What may need explaining about this photograph is not what you see, but just how collecting it would work. How many prints of it are out there? How does the print that's for sale in Pioneer Square relate to the one that hangs on the walls at the Museum of Modern Art?

Tomorrow at 2 pm at the gallery, Michelle Dunn Marsh will give a free talk on the fascinating business of collecting photography.

Dunn Marsh is a longtime editor of Aperture magazine who happens to be based in Seattle as well as New York, and she's also a collector herself, mainly of black-and-white 20th-century photography. (She is also a straight shooter and just an interesting woman.) To get a sense of her ideas about photography and collecting, check out the Q&A Peggy Roalf did with her here. For instance,

PR: The 2012 exhibition season has launched with the announcement of dozens of exhibitions of black-and-white photography, from coast to coast, from vintage mid-20th century prints to contemporary work. It’s inevitable that there would be a black-and-white backlash, but have you had any thoughts on why, right now?

MDM: I’m so glad you asked that. I think the industry decline of many aspects of traditional photography has brought the scarcity and preciousness of black-and-white to the forefront. The travails of brands like Kodak and Polaroid speak to the masses—but photographers have been grappling with these changes for some time.

I think that many collectors are now responding to the craft of the print, in our increasingly digital age. We’ve finally accepted the photograph as object again, not just an image. Where once darkroom work was perceived as mechanical compared to the artistry of painting, now the “wet” darkroom is seen as a place of alchemy, and digital printing is deemed, by many, as rote (but it is no easier to get a consistent digital print than it is to get a consistent darkroom print. Finesse is required in either process).

I find a richness and a depth that is seductive in a silver or platinum print. I take respite primarily in black-and-white images because I experience the world each day in color, so the graphic quality of a tonal range from light to dark, free of chroma and without a light source burning into my eyes, transports me. That said, I recently bought a William Christenberry print because his green warehouse is the exact shade of the barn I grew up with.

With the general state of the world feeling a bit fragile these days, I think that many people are turning away from the physically monumental to the wonder that can exist within an environment the eye can absorb in a glance, and then revisit slowly, over time.