Experiments in film soup - part 5

Hello, and welcome to part 5 of my occasional series where I share images altered by the film soup process.

These were taken on 35mm Kodak gold film, with a vintage Olympus OM10 camera.

After finishing the roll, I soaked the film canister in a solution of water with a bit of dish soap for 24 hrs., drained it, and let it dry out for several weeks. 

I then sent it off for special processing (don't use a regular lab, it will mess up their chemistry) and these are the results.

I'm still learning the ins and outs of this camera, so some of the images are not perfectly exposed, but I likes the eerie vibes of the above photo nonetheless.

All of these images are from various places along the Montour Trail, south of Pittsburgh PA.

I'm finding that in general, dish soap, which is a base, gives a very different vibe than lemon/lime juice, which is an acid. Of course there are a lot of variables inherent to the process, just like working with cyanotype, but learning to control for some of the variables is what makes these experiments so much fun.

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Experiments in wet cyanotype - part 98

Welcome to part 98 of my ongoing experiments with the wet cyanotype process. You can access them all, in reverse chronological order, by clicking the Wet Cyanotype tab in the header. 

In this post I continue my mini-obsession with red mulberry leaves. The red mulberry, Morus rubra, is the native tree here in the eastern US. The white mulberry, which I come across much more frequently, is an invasive that was introduced here to feed caterpillars for the silk industry. The two are now frequently cross-breeding, to the detriment of the reds; I don't know if the specimen I found is the pure variety or not. The leaves of the red are much larger than the white, and the shapes are wonderful for printing with.

I began this session with two large panels on cotton sateen, then added some single leaves on mineral paper. I mixed a bit of Solarfast solar dye with the cyanotype chemicals.

Here are the prints after a long exposure, and before rinse out.

The rusty brown tones on the mineral paper will be transformed when rinsing, it's a lot of fun to watch.

Here are the finished prints. I love the all the subtle patterning and color distribution on the cotton prints.

Lots of swirls and fun stuff on the mineral paper prints as well.

These are wildly unpredictable, so it's always a fun surprise to see the way they turn out. 

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Experiments in wet cyanotype - part 97

 

Welcome to part 97 of my documented experiments in wet cyanotype printing. I started this project in June of 2017, and it has continued to hold my interest over the intervening years.

I began this batch with a large branch of red mulberry leaves on a cotton sateen panel. The mix was mostly cyanotype chemicals with just a splash of Jacquard solarfast solar dyes. 

I then prepped 3 smaller panels with the same setup. 

I still had some leaves to play with, so I did some panels on mineral paper.

These were all set out in strong sunlight and left to develop for several hours.

Here are all the panels after exposure, but before rinsing. Those greenish colors in the centers of the leaves are undeveloped chemicals that generally rinse out or become bluish. The pinkish tones are from the Solarfast, and they may or may not rinse out, depending.

Here are the finished prints. I am quite pleased with them.

The mineral paper prints are especially swirly and I love them.

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Celebrating American Craft 2025 Acceptance

Greenhouse Effect

I am delighted to share that Greenhouse Effect has been juried into Celebrating American Craft 2025 at the Sarratt Gallery at Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN. This juried exhibition features the work of 34 craft based artists from across the USA. With clay, fiber, metal, wood or glass these works demonstrate the skills, voice and heart of contemporary craft art. The exhibit opens September 8th and runs until October 31st.

Greenhouse Effect, detail.

My statement for this work: Alarmed by global climate change and frequent dramatic weather events, I’ve been working on a series of weather-related quilts. The greenhouse effect is a process that occurs when gases in the Earth's atmosphere trap the Sun's heat. This makes the Earth much warmer and contributes to extreme weather, wildfires, droughts, and agricultural disruptions. For this quilt I made prints of leaves from species native to my micro-environment in Pennsylvania, as many are showing stress related to these changes.

Materials: Artist painted and commercial cotton, silk, wool fabrics

Techniques: Wet process cyanotype and solar dye prints, monoprints, patchwork, stitching

Size: 62"h x 48"w

I am always particularly pleased when my work is included in a fine craft venue; to me it represents the best of contemporary art.

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Experiments in film soup - part 4

This first set of striking images were taken in a somewhat mundane place, the Waterfront shopping center in Homestead, PA, just outside of Pittsburgh. One of the reasons I love it here is that the mundane is often side-by-side with the transmundane; there are relics of the industrial age everywhere, hinting at history.

I used my Nikon N6006 camera, which is rapidly becoming one of my favorites, loaded with Kodak Max 400 35mm film. 

I souped the film for about 24 hours in diluted lime juice, then let it dry out for several weeks.

I had them processed by Film Lab 135 , then lightly edited the digital images.

As with my wet cyanotype work, I absolutely love the unpredictability of the process, and the way the resulting images challenge my preconceived notions about what the world looks like.

A pink bridge, with green clouds? I'm mesmerized.

These last three images were taken while hiking along the Northwest Lancaster County River Trail, an old familiar haunt of mine, along the Susquehanna River near Marietta, PA. 

There was a light glaze of ice along some of the shadier sections.

And I never tire of this view, looking towards the bridges in Columbia.

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