For many years I carried a camera bag everywhere. At least one Nikon FE2, spare lenses, filters, film. Often a Mamiya C330S TLR medium-format, with a couple of spare lenses too. Rarely, all the large-format stuff plus a horrifically expensive tripod.
I carried this bag every day while working as a research scientist in London, for about 7 years. Sometimes I even took photos. But the presence of the bag taught me how to discover potential pictures as I walked around. It taught me what I liked to look at, and what I liked to photograph.
The price for this self-knowledge was that, when I got measured for a suit, the tailor asked if I wanted one shoulder built up – carrying the bag for so long meant one shoulder was now a few centimetres lower than the other. And still is.
I was committed to film photography. As a scientist I always had access to a darkroom (thank you to all the electron-microscopists I’ve known). Until I moved to a lab which didn’t have one.
So, in early 2002 I started working out how I could make photos at home, and came across the cyanotype process.
No darkroom needed.
Cheap.
Simple.
And blue.
I was smitten from the start.
I’ve spent the last 23 years almost exclusively making cyanotypes, or using the process as part of my artistic practice. What I love about cyanotype is the potential.
Starting with raw chemicals – that are utterly simple to prepare and use – you can work on paper, fabric, ceramic, wood… the choice of media is completely in your control. And so is the size of image. Want to make a 1cm2 picture of a tiny flower? Fine! Want to put your own life-size silhouette onto a quilt cover? No problem. All is possible, at home – no special equipment needed.
I love that cyanotype lets me express things photography never could. It feels more engaged. I am no longer a viewer, snapping what I see before me. Instead I am directly connected, the constructor of whatever I have imagined as an image.
I love that it is often a slow process – slower than large format, even! The contemplative mood it requires is rare and precious.
I love working in the sun, or rain, or snow. But mostly sun. Though once you realise that UV light is always there, even on the darkest days, then the whole year can be full of cyanotypes.
I love standing over a composition as it exposes, judging exposure time by gut feeling, guesswork and hope.
I love washing prints, seeing the colour change, finding out if the exposure was right after all.
I love where cyanotype has taken me – making exposures over a year or more, discovering a way to go beyond blue without toning, crossing cyanotype and origami to create metamorphograms, learning from people living with dementia, showing my work in solo exhibitions, presenting at mathematics and origami conferences, publishing peer-reviewed articles on philosophy of memory, and seeing my metamorphogram process in an academic design book.
Even after 23 years, cyanotype still feels like a little bit of magic, a twinkling light leading me through a forest of yet-to-be-imagined deep blue images.
I love cyanotypes. I have over 20 years’ experience. I’ve worked out two new ways of using cyanotype – so far. And I want to share what I’ve learnt with anyone willing to listen, through these posts.
No secrets.
Open-source cyanotypes.
And if there are things you would like me to share, PLEASE GET IN TOUCH! That would be fabulous – this can be a lonely life at times. I sincerely hope this becomes an actively two-way process.
If you can support me as I do this, I will blush madly and try not to hide my face as I thank you most sincerely.
There are unique works available from my shop. Or perhaps just buy me a sheet of watercolour paper via KoFi . Thank you!
