There has never been a more exciting time for the art of photography. I have grown along with the digital revolution and embrace it as yet another challenge and a medium to enhance, or partner with, traditional photography. I am a collector of natural things…wishbones, leaves, twigs, vines, shells, and more. Though I have no immediate plan for these as they are collected, I place them in bowls or jars to rest, to be admired. I know that a synthesis will take place later at some magical moment when my eye is fresh and my camera is ready to explore their forms, to take a closer look.
Many of my latest artworks result from stepping back into traditional film photography. Along with savoring the diminishing supply of photographic film being manufactured and a recent opportunity that provided me with access to a color darkroom, I have been using both a 4 x 5 view camera and a 35mm film camera to photograph my collection of things inside the studio as well as outdoors in the natural environment. My placement of elements in the “Natural Intentions” photographs is unnatural; their arrangement shows the hand of mankind. Those that are vine-stitched or vine-wrapped reflect my passion for sewing and weaving. The resulting sets are quiet, bordering on ritualistic. Seen in the forest, they might make one stop and notice the deviant placement and wonder who placed them there and why are they arranged so.
Other recent works are wet-darkroom color photo-grams, many of which use items from my collections, placed by intuition and touch only on chromogenic dye coupler paper since there must be no light at all in the color darkroom. A few of my new works are mounted and encased in a layer of beeswax and presented as encaustic photography.
In a new Alternative Process series I have gathered specific medicinal plants traditionally used to treat female health issues such as breast tumors, childbirth, menstruation, and menopause. Lumen prints are created using traditional black and white gelatin silver darkroom photo paper. When the paper comes in contact with live plant material and left out in UV light for many hours, the paper reacts with the plant chemistry to produce lovely photographic images.