Alternative Photography
Alternative photographic process including cyanotype, anthotype, and chlorophyll printing.
Cyanotypes can be used to print negatives or to make silhouettes by placing objects on treated substrate and exposing them to the sun. Every print is unique as many variables affect the final piece including time of year, time of day, weather, solution application, temperature, humidity, and alkalinity of the water. These variables produce subtle differences in tone and colour that tie each piece to the location in which they were made. Some are also toned with plants to create different colours- the iron in the cyanotype binds to the tannins in the plants to make reds, greens, blacks, purples, and other colours. Tri-colour cyanotypes are made using a process of printing, bleaching, and toning in several layers.
Mapping Project (2023)
In the summer of 2023 during a residency at Deer Lake Park in BC, I made work using a land-based practice that is directed by materials, responsive to history, and in relationship with the people, plants, and animals I share the land with. I started by mapping the park to see what materials were available to use with alternative photographic processes. These 40 plant samples were printed as cyanotype photograms, and then toned with a tea bath made from the plant matter mixed with calcium carbonate, or after bleaching with sodium carbonate, or using lake water.
Cyanotype on Fabriano Unica paper, toned with various site-specific plants, lake water, tap water, washing soda, and calcium carbonate
11” x 13’
Shadows (2023)
An alternative approach to that taken in Mapping Project, where the cyanotype photograms were made using only the shadows of the plants. Their edges blur and resist the definition and categorization present in the earlier work.
Shadow photograms in cyanotype on Fabriano Unica paper, toned with various site-specific plants, tap water, washing soda, and calcium carbonate
26” x 42
News From Home (2023)
A piece exploring the history of Deer Lake Park as a public park and site of environmental conservation, the site of the Burnaby Art Gallery and Shadbolt Centre for the Arts, as well as a historically significant site for Indigenous, and the former site of the Oakalla Prison Farm.
Large format cyanotypes printed on cotton using original photographs of local wildlife, and archival newspapers.
Invasive (2023)
An image of the invasive species Japanese knotweed on the edge of Deer Lake park, tagged for pesticide treatment and removal. Toned with leaves from the invasive blackberries that cover the park.
Cyanotype print on Canson mixed media paper and toned with site-specific blackberry leaves and lake water
8.5” x 11”
Metrotown Meets Oakalla (2023)
A print made using the anthotype process where locally picked blackberries were used to stain the paper, which was then bleached by the sun using a positive of a photograph. This print shows the view looking across Deer Lake to the former site of Oakalla Prison Farm, now the site of luxury townhomes, with the towers of Metrotown shopping centre in the background.
Anthotype print using site-specific blackberries on Fabriano Unica paper
8” x 10”
Aquabus (2022)
Tri-colour cyanotype toned with madder root.
Georgia and Thibault (2021)
Tri-colour cyanotype tone with madder root and calcium carbonate.
Jericho Beach (2021)
Tri-colour cyanotype tones with madder root.
Midsommer (2021)
Tri-colour cyanotype toned with madder root and calcium carbonate.