Creative and Critical Studies, Faculty of (Okanagan)
DSpace
UBCO
Neal, Sam
Master of Fine Arts - MFA
University of British Columbia
Responding to Landscape is a supporting paper that documents and discusses my position as an artist in the Okanagan. Using the Okanagan bodies of water as the source for my practice, my research focuses on human and environmental wellbeing and responding to place. My thesis discusses how my methodology within artmaking embodies performance, time and transformation. I discuss my role as an artist by using photography and cyanotype - an alternative photographic process. I tie memory and experiences with the landscape and explore how my body performs with the environment to create a tangible piece of art. I speak about my role within the process and how the process developed into my thesis exhibition, Inland Waters II, held at the Lake Country Art Gallery. I incorporate the history of the cyanotype process and how I have utilized the process for my research. I introduce contemporary artists that use alternative processes in photography and have similar methods in their practices. I demonstrate how the temporality of the landscape is informed through my methodology. My thesis and exhibition artwork attempt to present a respectful way of responding to the environment by collaborating with it.
Responding to Landscape. by Sam Neal BA (Hons) Photography, University of Huddersfield, 2016 A THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF FINE ARTS in THE COLLEGE OF GRADUATE STUDIES (Visual Arts) THE UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA (Okanagan) November 2021 © Sam Neal, 2021 ii The following individuals certify that they have read, and recommend to the College of Graduate Studies for acceptance, a thesis/dissertation entitled: Responding to Landscape submitted by Sam Neal in partial fulfillment of the requirements of the degree of Master of Fine Arts. Denise Kenney Faculty of Creative and Critical Studies Supervisor Andreas Rutkauskas Faculty of Creative and Critical Studies Supervisory Committee Member Miles Thorogood Faculty of Creative and Critical Studies Supervisory Committee Member Dr Greg Garrard Faculty of Creative and Critical Studies University Examiner iii Abstract Responding to Landscape is a supporting paper that documents and discusses my position as an artist in the Okanagan. Using the Okanagan bodies of water as the source for my practice, my research focuses on human and environmental wellbeing and responding to place. My thesis discusses how my methodology within artmaking embodies performance, time and transformation. I discuss my role as an artist by using photography and cyanotype - an alternative photographic process. I tie memory and experiences with the landscape and explore how my body performs with the environment to create a tangible piece of art. I speak about my role within the process and how the process developed into my thesis exhibition, Inland Waters II, held at the Lake Country Art Gallery. I incorporate the history of the cyanotype process and how I have utilized the process for my research. I introduce contemporary artists that use alternative processes in photography and have similar methods in their practices. I demonstrate how the temporality of the landscape is informed through my methodology. My thesis and exhibition artwork attempt to present a respectful way of responding to the environment by collaborating with it. iv Lay Summary This thesis discusses how I respond to landscape through artmaking and explores my relationship with the environment. I will discuss my practice in photography and other artistic processes. The thesis describes how, in the exhibition, I invited the local community to participate in the process I take part in. The artwork shown in the exhibition is directly informed by the environment in which it was created. The resulting piece of art shows how water interacts with objects and the artist. The reader may use this thesis as a guide to learn about photographic processes and allow them to think about their environment. v Table of Contents Abstract ............................................................................................................................ iii Lay Summary ................................................................................................................... iv Table of Contents ............................................................................................................. v List of Figures .................................................................................................................. vi Acknowledgements ........................................................................................................ vii Chapter 1: Introduction.................................................................................................... 1 Chapter 2: Introduction to Methodology. ...................................................................... 4 2.1 Observing the Landscape. ........................................................................................... 4 Chapter 3: Cyanotype: An Alternative Process in Photography. ........................... 13 3.1 Introduction to Anna Atkins and Alternative Processes in Photography. .................... 13 3.2 Developing the Cyanotype. ........................................................................................... 17 3.3 Testing methodologies and developing the process. ................................................... 19 3.4 Collaboration and the Unfixed. ...................................................................................... 28 Chapter 4: Development of the process. ..................................................................... 34 4.1 Photographing the Cyanotype. ..................................................................................... 34 4.2 Screenprinting. .............................................................................................................. 40 Chapter 5: Reflection. .................................................................................................... 44 Bibliography .................................................................................................................... 49 vi List of Figures Figure 1 Neal, Sam. Belonging to the Lookout (2019). Pigment Print. 40x50cm. ......................... 9 Figure 2 Atkins, Anna. “Cystoseira Granulata.” The New York Library, Oct. 1843, digitalcollections.nypl.org/items. Accessed 5th November 2019. ................................................ 16 Figure 3 Neal, Sam. Cyanotype. 11x17 inches Usnea Fir, 2019, BC, Canada........................... 21 Figure 4 Neal, Sam. Digital photograph. 2019 Oyama, BC, Canada. ......................................... 25 Figure 5 Neal, Sam. Cyanotype. 22x30 inches Kalamalka Lake, 2019, BC, Canada. ............... 26 Figure 6 Neal, Sam. Cyanotype. 2020. ........................................................................................ 31 Figure 7 Neal, Sam. Digital Photograph. 2020............................................................................. 31 Figure 8 Neal, Sam. Video still. 2020 Kalamalka Lake, BC, Canada. ......................................... 32 Figure 9 Neal, Sam. Video still. 2020 Kalamalka Lake, BC, Canada. ........................................ 32 Figure 10 Neal, Sam. Digital Photograph. 2020 Kalamalka Lake, BC, Canada. ........................ 35 Figure 11 Neal, Sam. Cyanotype. 2020 Mill Creek, BC, Canada. ............................................... 36 Figure 12 Neal, Sam. Video still. 2020 Mill Creek, BC, Canada. ................................................. 37 Figure 13 Neal, Sam. Digital Photograph. 2020 Mill Creek, BC, Canada. .................................. 38 Figure 14 Neal, Sam. Digital Photograph. 2020 Mill Creek, BC, Canada. .................................. 39 Figure 15 Neal, Sam. Digital Photograph. 2020 Mill Creek, BC, Canada. .................................. 40 Figure 16 Neal, Sam. Digital Photograph. 2021 Lake Country, BC, Canada. ............................. 42 vii Acknowledgements I would like to first acknowledge that the land in which I live and work, is the traditional, ancestral and unceded territory of the Syilx peoples. I would also like to acknowledge my supervisory committee, Denise Kenney, Andreas Rutkauskas, and Miles Thorogood, who, over the last two years have supported me throughout my journey. I would like to thank Briar Craig, Philip Wyness, Joanne Gervais Nancy Holmes, Tania Willard, and Dr Aleksandra Dulic for your continued support. I appreciate the faculty, staff and students who have supported me in some capacity throughout my studies. 1 Chapter 1: Introduction. This thesis will explore my initial response to landscape, beginning with my perception of 'Nature' and distance within my artistic process. I then discuss my transition to making work directly informed by the environment I am living in, resulting in an ecological approach to artmaking that embodies performance, transformation, chance and community engagement. Landscape, for me, can be separated into two words, 'Land' and 'Scape'. Land is everything that surrounds me, and 'Scape' is what I project onto it. 'Nature,' on the other hand, comes with complex questions. Is anything 'Nature'? What is our (human) role in 'Nature'? Are we separate or entangled within 'Nature'? Kate Soper explains that "In its commonest and most fundamental sense, the term 'nature' refers to everything which is not human and distinguished from the work of humanity" (Soper 24). During the beginning of my research, I attempted to find an answer to my relationship with 'Nature,' only to discover that I was constructing, using photography, an idealized framing of what I thought 'Nature' was. I found that I created an artificial response in my depiction of 'Nature' – a shallow description of the sublime – influenced by Western photographers such as Ansel Adams. The sublime was first appreciated as a natural phenomenon. Cycles of sedimentation and erosion of geological features that required time much greater than the human life cycle were depictions of the sublime. In contrast, human impact on the environment and artificial creation has become the 'sublime' force. 2 Soper also states that "In our own time the human impact on the environment has been so extensive that there is an important sense in which it is correct to speak of 'nature' as itself a cultural product or construction" (Soper 152). Although 'Nature' can be described as everything other than human – at the beginning of my research, which I will discuss in Chapter Two – I was photographing from a vantage point that implied distance and my depiction of 'Nature'. However, my journey to get to the vantage point was artificial to some extent. Roads and a "man-made" fire lookout allowed me to photograph the landscape. Further, trees within the photograph could have been planted by humans. While tree planting is a form of replacement and preservation, it becomes a byproduct of human intervention within the landscape. Although these are positive functional ways of sustaining the environment, the term 'Nature' may not be plausible in describing an environment. Throughout this writing, I will describe my transition from my perception of 'Nature' and 'Distance' to making artwork in response to ecological thought. "The ecological thought is the thinking of interconnectedness" (Morton 7). The transition explores how I become in touch with my surroundings by eliciting an artistic methodology by working directly with the environment. I do my best to leave no trace, and I respect the landscape when working within it. How do I make work in response to my surroundings? I posed this question when I first started my studies. My position as an artist, sense of belonging, and how the next two years would unfold were deeply unfamiliar. What I have learned since then is that no matter how much I prepare, embracing change and exploring the unknown has become 3 a familiar territory and kept me grounded. This thesis explores just that by responding to a landscape where I find myself learning my artistic process. Chapter Two will discuss my initial research and the background of my methodology. Much of my initial research concerns my observation of the landscape and capturing it by using photography. In Chapter Three, I will explore historic and contemporary artists who have influenced my methodology and then guide the reader through the process that I take part in. Finally, I will discuss where the process derived and how I inform the landscape in my process. Chapter Four discusses how the process ultimately developed by using digital and traditional printmaking techniques. Finally, in Chapter Five, I reflect and describe how I have developed a methodology over the last two years and held an exhibition that showcases the body of work. 4 Chapter 2: Introduction to Methodology. In this chapter, I will discuss my relationship with landscape in the beginning of my research and how I reflected on my experiences with landscape. It is important to acknowledge that this chapter will give an insight into the beginning of my research and create a foundation for the process I ultimately participate in. I use my initial observations of place, time and process to develop my relationship with the environment. In the subsequent chapters, I will describe how I incorporated the cyanotype process into my methodology in response to my position as an artist. 2.1 Observing the Landscape. The encounters along the journey to creating art transform the experience of the artmaking itself. In photography, the negative’s exposure to the light becomes merely a small part of the process. The photograph signifies an experience I have with the subject and a combination of reality and my imagination, yet the photographic process; for example, previsualization, loading the film, and moving through the landscape, are all essential steps that lead to taking a photograph. When I print the photograph, all of these steps are fused together, and the print becomes a representation of an experience. Moving through ‘Nature’ and covering a distance towards my destination becomes part of the photograph too. When I am taking a photograph, I am looking into the viewfinder, composing, metering, and then pushing the cable release button, thinking of its mechanism and listening to what I call the hissing of the lens being fired. It almost feels 5 like a surgical procedure that, if not meticulously executed, could result in the failure of the photograph’s creation. As artists, we have many materials at our disposal with which we can perhaps carve, sculpt or paint to create something. For me, I am presented with a landscape and it is up to me how I choose to frame it. When I take a photograph of a landscape, I attempt to imply distance, and capture what I experience. The photograph becomes a reflection of what I saw and felt in that moment of composing and being with the landscape. When the photograph is exhibited, the viewer is presented with the opportunity to place themselves in the landscape and explore their experiences within my representation of that landscape. I, as the creator, can also reignite my experience and reflect upon it at various times throughout the process. I do this when I look at the negative that returns to me after it has been developed. I take my time to look around the negative. Unlike the contact print, where finer details are lost, the negative holds incredible detail. The negative reflects the layers of time that are associated with the experience before capturing the photograph. It takes longer to look around the negative than it does in a contact print. If I was to only scan and make a contact print, generally used for proofing, these smaller details that I associated with the experience would be lost. Stephen Shore refers to looking at the contact print as seeing a “surreal density of information” and that “fifteen minutes of attention had been compressed into this thing you can take in, in a few seconds” (Shore). However, when the print is enlarged, the smaller details that are seen in the negative begin to be revealed. Similarly, cameraless photographic printing methods 6 such as cyanotype contain a large amount of information. In addition, the negative can be created at any scale, allowing the viewer to have a bodily experience with the work. The photograph is usually a moment frozen in time and the viewer is left to decide what happened before and after, giving them the power to create an experience for themselves. It is within this paradigm that I surrender my photograph to the viewer to allow them the opportunity to have their narratives and interpretations, to possibly stumble upon the punctum, “that accident which pricks me” (Barthes 27). The punctum is not something that can be found and then explained by the viewer. It belongs and is forever personal to the viewer. Sometimes an experience with the landscape can influence my practice in other ways rather than photographing it. In a similar way to how the punctum affects somebody, a landscape can move us too. The encounter can be a performance of nature that I can experience alone and contain within my memories. The memories that I take from these experiences become a part of me, and as an artist, I sometimes make work in response to the experience, or I take small fragments of the experience and store them in my memory. For example, in 2015, I visited Iceland. On my last evening I spent the night in a hotel instead of my tent. I looked out of my hotel room window, just as I had opened the fly on the tent each night to see if the night sky was clear. I could see the northern lights faintly. I immediately knew that I had to go outside as my experience could not belong to this indoor space. Just before I left, I grabbed my digital camera. I wandered out into the darkness away from any lights and I immersed myself in the dancing colours. I did not take one photograph that evening. I just watched. I forgot I even had my camera with me. I was simply enjoying the experience of being a 7 part of this natural phenomenon that revolved around me. I do not regret not taking any photographs. Some things can be left to wonder. The vivid memory will always be personal to me in a way that looking at my camera screen could not have replicated. These experiences form my relationship with the landscape. The palette of blues and greens that disappeared into the distance became stored in my memory and I can move back into that experience for inspiration, and to seek solitude. Upon my return from Iceland, I was confronted by the banality of my everyday surroundings: a busy urban city, and for some time, I did not appreciate it. However, I decided to walk regularly, which opened my mind to the place I was situated. I began to see beauty in the otherwise forgotten or unnoticed spaces within the city. I found that I could use photographs and experiences that I had taken in Iceland to build a relationship with my environment. Although the “man-made” environment surrounded me, I began to appreciate how the light played amongst surfaces of the industrial spaces and how I could use the beauty in the banal as a portal to other experiences. The relationship between me and the landscape derives from my experience of moving through the landscape and ultimately looking out from various vantage points. I choose to stop at different points along my journey and observe my surroundings. I look out into the distance over mountains and forests, watching the light change over time on the mountains. The final photograph relies deeply on how the landscape made me feel in the moments leading up to when I decide to take the photograph. I absorb the scenery, sounds and smells and consider these in my composition. I look into the distance and determine the depth of my photograph. The external events in the landscape (nature, time and space) meet with the internal event (memory, experience) to make the photograph. 8 The ways that light and weather transform the view of the mountains affects the way in which I experience the landscape too. For me, the layers of clouds create a wildness aesthetic fitting with notions of the sublime whereas a clear blue sky provoked different emotions and feelings such as calmness and nostalgia. My experiences of being with the landscape resonate with a passage by Rebecca Solnit, who describes the experience we have with the colour blue and how we look into the distance: For many years, I have been moved by the blue at the far edge of what can be seen, that color of horizons, of remote mountain ranges, of anything far away. The color of that distance is the color of an emotion, the color of solitude and of desire, the color of there seen from here, the color of where you are not. And the color of where you can never go. For the blue is not in the place those miles away at the horizon, but in the atmospheric distance between you and the mountains. (Solnit 29) The blue light that scatters onto the mountains and the blue of the northern lights that I have seen disappear into the distance have helped me to frame my work. My place within the landscape and the bird’s eye perspective from which I choose to photograph, embodies the ideas surrounding distance, time and space within the landscape. The vantage point and taking my time enables me to meditate on the horizon and be receptive to my surroundings before I take the photograph. The landscape assembles in my mind like a pool of colours presented in front of me and layers itself to form a relationship between us. It creates a pause in a space, like in poetry or music. It creates a space to breathe. I move through this landscape and depict it the way I see and feel, using only the experience and the written translations in my diary 9 to create harmony between nature and myself. This leads me to discuss a recent photograph that I have taken from a fire lookout in the mountains of British Columbia. The experience of being at the lookout was reminiscent of when I was working on a project in Iceland. In both environments, I found myself lost in a moment of belonging to my surroundings, and I was presented with a landscape that made me feel most alive. In the Vatnajökull National Park, Iceland, I had my camera over my shoulder as I walked over a rubble mound which slowly revealed the horizon behind it. I was presented with an open lagoon filled with sparkling icebergs drifting slowly across the mirrored body of water and into the distance. I was photographing the blue that I find to resonate with inner peace and the desire to be in the landscape. Although I was composing and making an Figure 1 Neal, Sam. Belonging to the Lookout (2019). Pigment Print. 40x50cm. 10 aesthetical choice when photographing the landscape, the result is how I visualized the experience and how I wanted the viewer to see the photograph. Before taking the photograph Belonging to the Lookout, I researched artists who had experienced working as a fire lookout. I questioned myself when I stood at the lookout: How did I come upon this vantage point? Why is this the place that resonates with me most? What is it about this place and not another? Jack Kerouac’s Desolation Angels and The Dharma Bums were influenced by experiences he had as a fire lookout. Gary Snyder and Philip Whalen wrote poems while they were fire lookouts, interacting with the landscape, looking into the distance and meditating on ‘Nature’. The idea of spending time at the lookout and the growing experience of belonging to the land signifies not only the importance of the purpose of them being there but the bodily experience one can have with the landscape too. The lookout that I photographed from was built in 1927 during the Forest Conservation Movement and it is still being maintained. When I arrived at the lookout, I felt that I had a relationship with the lookout already because I had done some research beforehand. I could focus my experience on the landscape surrounding the lookout and the photograph that I would make. I left my camera in my bag for a few minutes so that I could spend time with the landscape and become receptive to my surroundings. I looked out into the distance, composing myself and the photograph. I let the collaboration unfold between me and the landscape. I let the relationship develop and influence my decision in the making of the photograph. I heard the call of a raven - raspy and from the back of its throat - echoing around me. The cloud formations created a certain wildness aesthetic to the landscape juxtaposed with the dark green trees penetrating the sky. The blue light scattered on the distant mountains, the colour of where 11 I wanted to go but could not. I knew in those moments that my photograph had to reflect the desire to be in that landscape, to portray the feeling of overlooking the forest and mountains, to allow the viewer to glide across the landscape and want to go further into the distance. The resulting photograph then acts as a portal, navigating the concept of time and space within photography. When I look at a photograph, there has to be a balance of mystery and relatability to experience it fully. It may be a colour or an object within the photograph that triggers an escape to another dimension. It may generate a feeling of nostalgia. The viewer can become a participant within the frame and explore the space within it. The film containing my photograph Belonging to the Lookout was sent to a faraway place to be developed and continues to carry not just a photograph exposed onto film, but a physical reflection of my experience with the landscape. The relationship I have with the landscape that I encountered from the lookout triggered that same emotion that Solnit speaks to in the colour blue. The colour of inner peace. The colour that dissolved into the snow-capped mountains and ultimately guided me into the distance. After my film returns to the mailbox, I anxiously await my work, carefully opening the fragile taped envelope. Questions fill my mind, taking control over the experience of the reveal. Is there going to be a problem? Did I photograph correctly? Did the lab develop the film properly? When I have looked at the negative and I am assured that they are sharp and exposed successfully, I can now relax. I then scan and look through the images once, then I step away from them for a few days. I do not want the anxiety to overlap with my editing or printing and so I step away from it and leave my work to settle. By stepping 12 away from the photographs the fragile relationship of my experience with the landscape is retained. I then begin the process of printing the photograph. If the film is black and white, I will print it in the darkroom. Printing in the darkroom poses a new set of challenges and experiences. The outcome of the print is entirely controlled by me, using a combination of light, chemicals, and watching the paper reveal the image. I print digitally with colour negatives. Although the experience is not the same as it is in the darkroom, I am still able to reignite the experience I had when I was photographing. The physical print can now be displayed creating a conversation between the viewer and the photograph. A moment to reflect before the process of creating and taking my film to be sent away begins again. 13 Chapter 3: Cyanotype: An Alternative Process in Photography. 3.1 Introduction to Anna Atkins and Alternative Processes in Photography. Without being fully conscious of my decision to transition from photographing ‘Nature’ to using an alternative process in photography, I felt that I needed a more tangible relationship between my artistic process and the environment. This section will discuss John Herschel's discovery of the cyanotype and investigate the evolution of alternative processes in photography – from historical to contemporary perspectives. I will describe my interpretation of the cyanotype and other artists who work with alternative processes in photography. An alternative process refers to non-traditional methods of photographic printing, such as digital pigment prints. The cyanotype was invented in 1842, however, it is widely practiced in the twenty-first century. The cyanotype was utilized by engineers in the late 1800s, coining the term blueprint. Using it as a contemporary method of making artwork with the land has become more common amongst artists. I participate in the cyanotype process for many reasons. I ground myself through the “hands on” practice; I improve my mental wellbeing by working in the landscape at a natural pace; and I enjoy employing sustainable art practices. Artists in other alternative processes also use the environment as a collaborator. Susan Derges, for example, uses light-sensitive material and a flashlight to capture water, using the water as a metaphor that connects everything. Roberto Huarcaya employs a similar methodology, working at a large scale and using a flashlight to expose the forest 14 onto scrolls of photographic paper. The night is essential in both methods due to the sensitivity of photographic paper when exposed to light. The cyanotype process is significantly less sensitive to light which, in turn, allows me to spend time with the cyanotype when I am exposing it and then watching it transform. The slowness to the transformation was essential at the beginning of the process. The methodology of waiting and acknowledging the environment before attempting to capture it coincided with my photography methodology. While I discovered these artists' practices after I began using cyanotype, I feel their methods align with my own; by making art that is directly informed and interacted with by the environment in which it is created. I see the process not explicitly belonging to me, as much as I do not belong to these lands in the Okanagan. The process is a form of collaboration with the landscape and about building a relationship with it. I begin to take more control over the process when I am photographing and then screen-printing. I see the potential for the unknown within the works and how, for the viewer, the work becomes something mysterious, possibly abstract. The term alchemy plays a significant role in the process too. Alchemy is a process that changes and transforms in a seemingly magical way. The large pieces of paper that I pre-coat with a lime green solution that makes up the cyanotype chemicals can transform into something complex and unexplainable yet have a poetic nature. My hands are guided by the material and the water. As the work comes into the physical realm, the water can represent the circulatory system of the landscape, connecting the waterways between each piece. Water can also become a metaphor for the circulatory systems in our bodies. There is a moulding together of invention and intervention within 15 the process, with a pinch of serendipity. I began with natural material in my research into the cyanotype process, using Usnea, a form of lichen, to observe how naturally occurring material would respond to the cyanotype process. However, the accidental splashes when I attempted to fix the paper led me onto a different tangent, which will be discussed later in Chapter Three, "Developing the Cyanotype." Prussian blue – the pigment in the cyanotype retained after developing and fixing the print – was also an accidental discovery. Prussian blue was arguably discovered by a colour maker called John Jacob Von Diesbach and alchemist Johann Conrad Dippel who wanted to make a red pigment called Florentine lake (Galan). Instead, the dye reacted with iron compounds, potentially caused by the interference of animal blood, and formed the pigment Prussian blue. 16 Often considered the first person to publish a photographic book, Anna Atkins utilized the cyanotype process to study plant matter. The book: "Photographs of British Algae: Cyanotype Impressions" shows plant specimens that have been placed onto a piece of pre-coated paper and exposed to light. Figure two shows one of these plant specimens. After exposing the cyanotype, the image is fixed by washing it in water, leaving a white negative on a cyan background. The Prussian blue pigment is retained on the paper and creates what we know as the cyanotype. By destroying a specimen, Atkins was able to make the cyanotype. There then becomes tension between the sustainable aspect of the cyanotype process versus the act of destroying something to make the work. I attempt Figure 2 Atkins, Anna. “Cystoseira Granulata.” The New York Library, Oct. 1843, digitalcollections.nypl.org/items. Accessed 5th November 2019. 17 not to disturb the environment and preserve what happens on the paper in my approach. However, there is an element to the destruction of the paper's fibres when they become wet during the process. There is a crispness to Anna Atkins's botanical impressions. They become photographic portraits and scientific observations of different species. The physicality of placing the object over paper forms a relationship with the environment. My artistic practice continues to blend contemporary digital processes with manual printmaking processes. The impression of water that I attempt to capture is influenced and will continue to be influenced by the early Anna Atkin's cyanotypes. Although the process began in 1842, and I am consciously working in a process that artists practiced before what photography is today, I see it as a contemporary method of artmaking and one that connects the artist to the object in an exciting way while paying homage to its invention and utilization. 3.2 Developing the Cyanotype. In this chapter, I will discuss how my methodology within artmaking embodies performance, time and transformation. I will discuss how I respond to the environment in my art practice using cyanotype. I will also discuss my methodology in the cyanotype process and how the cyanotype can capture elements of the environment. I will explore how alternative processes in photography can be manipulated and how the aesthetic of these alternative processes is influenced by the environment. The cyanotype is the alternative process that I use. Because I have to physically work with the sensitized paper on-site and in the water, I explore how my body performs 18 with the environment to capture water flow on the paper's surface. In addition, I explore how my body performs with the land to create a tangible piece of art. The resulting piece of art questions how water interacts with objects and humans, how humans perform with nature and how we can document a place through an abstract map. I am drawn to how water appears to change colour when light moves across it, how we can see water's surface and its depths and how light reflects and refracts to create optical caustics. The cyanotype process breathes simplicity, yet the changing ways in which we can manipulate the material and challenge how the cyanotype will be displayed on a wall of a gallery space are diverse. Since the cyanotype was first realized by John Herschel in 1842 (Herschel 247) and then utilized by Anna Atkins by creating a series of botanical records of algae to make the first photography book (Hope Saska 9), the cyanotype and alternative processes of photography have been challenged in many ways. Contemporary artists such as Susan Derges and Roberto Huarcaya challenge how we can use camera-less photography and how we can manipulate objects and build relationships with the land. Adam Jeppeson is a contemporary artist who works in the medium of cyanotype in several of his works. One of the works, 'The Pond,' implements an expression of his hands by using negatives placed over pre-coated materials and making a cyanotype with them. The hands appear to be suspended in water when juxtaposed with the blue tones in the print. The interaction of the material, blurred movement, abstraction and impressions of the hand interested me in his work. Natural lighting is the only light source for the exhibition 'The Pond' – connecting the work further to ‘Nature’ – and the viewer can engage with it differently from how they would in an artificially lit space. The viewer 19 has to adjust to the changing light. For example, if there are shadows in the space, the viewer can go closer to see the details of the prints. I see connections between these artists and my work. Responding to the landscape by using alternative processes insists on physical participation to make the work. They connect the body to the landscape, informing the artmaking through gesture or guidance of the hands to make the work. 3.3 Testing methodologies and developing the process. Since moving to the Okanagan in 2019, I have found more of a connection to the ground and what is immediately before me rather than longing to be in the distance. I felt this connection when I went on a trip to Golden, British Columbia, in October 2019. I initially began documenting places along the Columbia River using my medium format film camera, not necessarily photographing the beautiful landscapes but also the banal places that I encountered. The act of photographing the locations along the Columbia River was intriguing in its subject matter. I photographed bridges that connected communities to the main highways and backroads that led to the river. During this trip, I became concerned with the disconnection between myself and the place that I was photographing. I thought about the long distance between where I was living in the Okanagan and the Columbia River, knowing that I would not be able to return easily over the winter. During my brief encounter with the river, I addressed these concerns and decided that I was not allowing enough time for me to build a relationship with the environment. I instead decided to ask the land what I could do for it as much as what it could do for me. I wondered how artmaking could connect to the landscape, so I began 20 to think about capturing the landscape using alternative processes. I wanted to engage with the environment, embrace change and build a new relationship with the environment. As a result, I thought about engaging myself and the community by making work that could help develop a relationship with the landscape. In my opinion, forming relationships and potentially learning to respect the environment through artmaking is what I can do for the landscape in return. The following week, I was teaching a workshop with my fine arts cohort of students, tying memory and archival imagery to an alternative photographic process. I chose to use cyanotype, an eco-friendly, cost-effective photographic process that is simple to use. Before my trip to Golden, I coated paper with cyanotype chemicals to take away with me. With the workshop being a week away, I could make recent cyanotypes of my own experiences with the land. The process would help articulate my understanding of the cyanotype. On one of the sheets, I placed a film negative of a photograph I had taken of a landscape in Revelstoke, the same landscape photograph I have discussed in Chapter Two, “Belonging to the Lookout.” I felt an emotional attachment to the photograph, and I wanted to research ways of reactivating my experience with the landscape by using an alternative process. However, due to cloudy weather, the negative could not form an image on the paper. I admit that not all encounters in photography or alternative processes in photography are going to be successful. I recently enjoyed a piece of writing by Michael Dennis Browne, which helped me think about failure as something positive. The chapter referred to writers. However, all artists may benefit: 21 But while it’s impossible not to refer to the griefs that can be associated with failure, my main purpose here is to rescue the word from merely dire connotations, dust it off a little, and then return it to its place in the life of the writer. I don’t see the sense of incompletion as something necessarily desperate but rather as something inevitable, which I need to learn to accept and even embrace. As artists we have to acknowledge the approximate-ness of what we can accomplish. (Browne 42) I deemed my first cyanotype print a failure, but one that would lead me on another tangent. I learned that I was not entirely in control of what was happening on the sensitized paper and that there was an element of chance in the process. The next day, I gathered natural material such as Usnea, a type of lichen, and used it to create a contact print with the sensitized paper. Fixing the print requires me to wash the print thoroughly in water. I will refer to fixing the print as the stage after the paper is Figure 3 Neal, Sam. Cyanotype. 11x17 inches Usnea Fir, 2019, BC, Canada. 22 developed in water and reaches its final state. The chemicals on the paper, covered by the material—in this case, Usnea—only partially expose to ultraviolet light and ultimately wash away in the water when developed and become white, as seen in figure three. The exposed areas of the paper permanently bond to the material as a result of the two chemicals—Ferric Ammonium Citrate and Potassium Ferricyanide—reacting to light and forming the pigment: Prussian blue (ferric ferrocyanide) (Mike Ware 617). Upon developing the print of the Usnea in the river water, splashes marked the paper, forming a relationship between the material and the environment. This accidental occurrence was due to the uneven development of the print. I discovered that the relationship between the material I chose to place over the cyanotype implied a landscape. In this artwork, the Usnea's intricate threads formed a texture on the cyanotype print reminiscent of braiding rivers photographed from overhead. The print showed the gesture of water, marking itself on the paper and, within that, a topographical landscape. Again, the external elements (water, weather) were left to chance. After returning home and receiving my developed film from the trip, I continued to experiment with the cyanotype process by printing transparencies of the places I had photographed and making contact prints with them. Although this was an essential part of learning my artistic process within cyanotype, the relationship between me and where I had taken the landscape photograph was still not where I wanted it to be. I was still circling back to the same conclusion; that there was a disconnect between myself and the place I had initially made the photograph. Fixing the print in tap water in the kitchen sink also distanced the process from the photograph's initial location. The process felt like I was stealing from the landscape rather than collaborating with it. I then explored different 23 methods in how the cyanotype process could react to different weather and different bodies of water. I kept referring back to the piece of Usnea that I used on my trip to Golden, and so I began testing methods of incorporating the bodies of water that surrounded where I was living as a source for the process. At this stage in my research, the print became more of a living being than a two-dimensional piece of artwork. During this time, I lived between two lakes, Wood and Kalamalka, in the small community of Oyama. Living here gave me easy access to these bodies of water and enabled me to connect with the environment. In the place I grew up, a small town in England, a lake with a similar resemblance would be a couple of hours drive away, and so to move to a place where lakes surrounded me was an excellent resource for a practicing artist. The methods I tested involved bringing small sheets of pre-coated paper to different bodies of water to see if I could form a relationship between myself and the environment using the cyanotype process. I sat on the beaches and watched the waves crash against the shore. Southerly winds caused waves on the northern side of Wood Lake in Oyama, whereas northerly winds would cause waves on the southern side of Kalamalka Lake, also in Oyama. I was able to choose which lake to go to, depending on which direction the wind came from. I observed that the weather might influence where the process should take place. If the wind direction blew away from the shore, water might not impact the material, and I would struggle to make the cyanotype. The material would be dipped into the water rather than impacted by it, not the kind of “collaboration” I was aiming for. These observations were important to acknowledge before initiating any contact with the water. They helped 24 me understand how the process might be affected by the environment. Although I had made these observations, it was still essential that I work with the land and that the element of chance might play a significant role within the process. This time, instead of placing an object onto the paper, exposing it to light and then developing the print in water, I decided to let the water impact the material first. * * * I can control many aspects of the cyanotype process, from exposure times to the objects used to hold down the print. However, water, light, and sediment create the final artwork when they react with the cyanotype chemicals. These factors, in turn, constitute a form of collaboration with the land. After painting the chemicals onto the paper and choosing where the cyanotype process will take place, I begin the performative stage. First, I wait for a moment before making contact with the water and paper, much like my process of photographing a landscape. By waiting, I can acknowledge the environment and its relationship with the process. Next, I submerge the paper into the water. Once the water impacts the paper and I am satisfied with how much contact has been made, I take it out of the water and leave it to expose and dry. * * * As the cyanotypes dried and transformed themselves next to the water, I began to see them as living beings. The paper started to curl as the water soaked through it, and pools of water on the paper's surface would transform in reaction to ultraviolet light and embed its pattern within its fibres. I would then fix the prints. I did this a few times, washing them in the same body of water that I exposed them to, which created the Prussian blue 25 seen in the cyanotype print. By taking the transparency of a photograph out of the process, I felt closer to the water. The 'contact' became the water rather than a piece of film laid over the top of the coated paper. I was arriving at the location. Sitting. Making contact with the water and then exposing the paper to sunlight. However, it also incorporated an ending to the process by washing the print after exposure to light. I would hang the print in my studio and see this aesthetically beautiful print. However, I knew that the process and the encounter with the land had ended. The photograph in figure four shows a cyanotype exposing on a beach at Kalamalka Lake. Sediment is scattered on the print, and there is a clear indication of where the water has impacted the material. Figure 4 Neal, Sam. Digital photograph. 2019 Oyama, BC, Canada. 26 The photograph in figure five shows the unexposed parts of the paper where sediment was scattered on the print and then washed off during the developing stage. The impact of water and the variation between blues and whites is still evident in the cyanotype. The scale of this piece was relatively small in relation to my body and the lake in which it was created. Working at this scale caused a disconnect in the performative aspect of encountering the water. To form more of a dialogue between me and the water, I decided to work with larger-scale pieces of paper. In doing so, there would be a stronger bodily relationship between me and the paper when the water impacts it. The water's contact with the paper was also not as prominent once it was developed compared to when it was exposing. Further, by washing and fixing the print, I denied the opportunity for the sediment and chemical interactions that had formed on the paper's surface to develop further. In addition to these problems, the cyanotypes would also bleed yellow. Figure 5 Neal, Sam. Cyanotype. 22x30 inches Kalamalka Lake, 2019, BC, Canada. 27 They dried and formed a yellow stain on the works where it should have been white. Yellowing in the cyanotype was due to the cyanotype process requiring running water for approximately ten minutes to thoroughly wash any remaining chemicals. The thickness of the paper, absorbing chemicals and water, and the size of the paper both contributed to this. Instead, I decided to continue the same process until the last step before leaving the location where the print had been exposing. I chose not to wash the print. I decided to leave any sediment on the print that sometimes naturally occurred or was used to keep the paper in place by weighing it down during the exposure. Sometimes I used rocks and wood to prevent the paper from blowing away. The artwork was then left to be exposed and dried on-site. After it dried, the cyanotype was brought inside and began to oxidize and change from slate grey into lavender blues and purples over the next several days. The transformation then slowed down. Choosing not to wash or fix the artwork challenges the cyanotype process. I use the same chemicals and follow the same procedures initially. However, I arrive at a different conclusion in the process. I posed questions such as: At what point in the process does the print become a cyanotype? After I brush the chemicals onto the paper? After it is washed? Does it ever become one if I am not practicing the process in the same way it was originally intended? For now, I will refer to the work as a cyanotype as it still utilizes many of the original steps in the process. The idea of impermanence with the unfixed cyanotype reflects the impermanence of the landscape where it was created. The cyanotype can continually change, and because it is left unfixed, there is an unknown element in how long the artwork will retain 28 its colour and texture. The sediment from the earth that embeds within the paper's fibres and the cyanotype's colour transformation reflects change. The paper retains small details of the earth and can grow or fall off the surface over time. Even one second later, the print occupies a different space within time. The transformation of the unfixed print forms a new visual perspective each time I revisit it. The transformation is especially apparent in the first few days of its lifetime, during the stages of exposing, drying and oxidizing. Afterwards, I revisit each piece and study the surface. Rust, as a result of iron compounds reacting to water and ultraviolet light, grows on the paper and shows decay whereas limestone crystals will show growth. Both are visually stimulating to see. A living object within an interior space reflecting its original environment. 3.4 Collaboration and the Unfixed. The connection between the overlapping of water, light and my engagement with the process explores a performative relationship with the environment that can be understood as a direct mapping of a place. A map, to some extent, becomes a part of the cyanotype process too. It reflects a location and becomes a container for memory and experience within that place. The cyanotype can act as a document of being in a place at some point in time. It holds no metadata, similar to film photography, and it is up to me to record exposure times, weather and location. It instead captures water, sediment and, more notably, a representation of geological time due to the sediment and living artifacts that are captured on the surface of the paper. The cyanotype becomes an abstract document of an actual event that took place. It carries on living and will slowly change in 29 colour or through the growth of sediment, transforming within the space it occupies, such as a gallery or studio wall. It evolves in collaboration with the environment it lives in. The medium of photography and painting merge within the cyanotype process. I paint the chemicals onto a blank piece of paper. I then expose the coated paper to water and light to create an image. The process does not strictly conform to one of the mediums; it instead combines elements of each to create something. The cyanotype inherits elements from each artistic practice such as brushstrokes and blank material (from painting) and using light to make an exposure and an image (from photography). My practice as a photographer had also influenced my methodology in the collaborative process when I decided to begin photographing the cyanotype during the exposure. The photographs were exhibited as part of my exhibition Inland Waters II. Fixing the transformation through photography allowed me to develop further my connection to the transformative aspect of the work. Before incorporating photography into the process, I would simply be watching the transformation. Now, the transformation of the artwork is captured and fixed by photography, and I can visualize the transformation of the cyanotype after the exposure. Furthermore, I can study the cyanotype after being exposed and make visual connections between the cyanotype and the photographs. I will discuss, in-depth, my photographic process in this chapter. The collaborative nature of the cyanotype process involving myself and the body of water embraces the unknown possibility of the work's outcome; I cannot fully control this collaborative process with the water. Cold weather makes the cyanotype fragile and brittle, freezing the surface of the water that sits on the paper. When the paper dries, it leaves fascinating textures leftover by the water that would not have occurred if the 30 transformation was interrupted. Nature decides the force of the impact with the paper and how it affects it. Some of the pieces reflect a sense of calmness, and some reflect disruption. Different weather affects the process, and the very nature of the environment is the ultimate decision-maker in how the process carries itself into the space where it will live. To step back and respond to the environment where I currently live as an artist by making the cyanotypes has been important for my artistic practice and mental health. I struggle with anxiety, and in the past, I have had reoccurring anxiety attacks. Being alone and grounding myself through this process helped me deal with these issues. Connecting with the landscape has been my escape from situations that trigger my anxiety. At the beginning of 2020, I had to learn a new way of living. Not knowing what the next week may look like was subdued by the act of sitting, watching and participating in the cyanotype process. While still respecting and acknowledging my living location, the process benefited my mental well-being. 31 Figure six shows a cyanotype made in collaboration with a spring runoff next to Kalamalka Lake. Water cascades over the rockface and flows down the scroll. The pre-coated paper begins to transform rapidly in the intense ultraviolet light. Using the scroll allowed me to have a different bodily experience with the process. I was able to touch the rockface and the slippery algae while I listened to the water trickling down the rocks and watched it flow over the cyanotype paper. Once the water had steadily flowed over the paper and began to transform, I carried the paper to a flat surface next to the lake and left it to dry. Figure seven shows the disruption of the chemicals as they were drying. The structure of the chemicals that began to form was reminiscent of the rockface on which it Figure 6 Neal, Sam. Cyanotype. 2020. Figure 7 Neal, Sam. Digital Photograph. 2020. 32 was created. The heat and intense ultraviolet light made the chemicals disperse and embed into the paper. Once I had carried the print onto a flat surface to expose and dry, I began videoing the transformation. Figures eight and nine are video stills taken at the beginning and end of the exposure. Once dry, the paper was rolled up and brought inside to oxidize over the next several days. The result was the scroll seen in figure six. After oxidization, the greys Figure 8 Neal, Sam. Video still. 2020 Kalamalka Lake, BC, Canada. Figure 9 Neal, Sam. Video still. 2020 Kalamalka Lake, BC, Canada. 33 transform into purples and blues, and the watermarks become more prominent on the paper's surface. The video shows a gradual transformation of the cyanotype. However, my interaction with the material during the change was limited. Therefore, I decided to photograph different parts of the material for future cyanotypes during its exposure. The process requires patience to sit with the paper while it dries, sometimes hours, so that the chemical interaction with the water and light has time to develop and is not interrupted. Each time the process is realized, I see new ways of how chemicals, light and water interact with the material. The process continually shifts in response to the time of year, weather, and body of water the paper is introduced to. My collaboration with the environment to create art explores the fragility of the land; it embodies performance and transformation made as a result of myself and the environment coming together. The cyanotypes in this process are left unfixed, and they retain sediment that is carried along with these bodies of water. They are impermanent objects that are susceptible to growth and decay. Fixing the cyanotype would require me to thoroughly wash the material and let it dry to its final state. By leaving them unfixed, sediment, algae, and other deposits that reacted with the chemicals remain on the paper's fibre. Further, depending on where I exhibit the cyanotype, for example, near a window where ultraviolet light contacts the paper, subtle shifts in tone can occur. I am enriched by the entire experience, absorbing the landscape and capturing the shape of water. 34 Chapter 4: Development of the process. 4.1 Photographing the Cyanotype. Light to create chemical reactions is central to photography. In film photography, the silver halides react when exposed to light. In the cyanotype process I participate in, the chemicals react to sunlight and water. I began to employ photographing the smaller details of the cyanotype once I realized how vital the shifts in colour and the transformation of the overall aesthetic over the following days were to the process. I was able to fix the exposing cyanotype by using photography and captured a time that no longer existed in the print. It was the anticipation of knowing that something was coming into existence due to my intervention with the water, which made me begin to notice, and photograph the changes. Composing and fixing a moment on the paper's surface that I can reflect upon and transcribe to the viewer was essential to the process to show the changes it has gone through over time. In the exhibition of the work, the viewer can develop a relationship between the screenprints and the cyanotype. They can see how the transformation began in the screenprints and then look at how they have changed into the original cyanotype. I treat the pieces as landscapes when photographing them, spending time with them and acknowledging their transformation. I focus on the more immediate details, such as a pooling of water slowly flowing off the paper, reminiscent of braiding rivers seen through a bird's eye perspective. These are the initial reactions between myself, my camera, and the paper. 35 Sometimes, if a breeze runs across the exposing paper, the retained pools of water will move back and forth, disturbing the fibres of the paper and the transformation. The breeze can force the water to make new paths across the paper. The paths can appear as waterways, reminding me of where the process began with the Usnea. The collaboration, in turn, carries on during the exposure. Figure 10 Neal, Sam. Digital Photograph. 2020 Kalamalka Lake, BC, Canada. 36 Figure ten is a photograph of a cyanotype exposing during a hot summer's day at Kalamalka Lake. The burnt orange colours resulted from hot weather and intense light reacting with cyanotype chemicals and water, rapidly transforming the work. The purple hues at the top were something I had not experienced before. Creases in the paper created shadows, chemicals and water dried like veins, growing, fading and embedding into the paper's fibres. The strong ultraviolet light limited my time spent with the piece during its initial transformation. So, I had to react to the changes relatively fast to capture the details on the paper's surface. I am now going to discuss a cyanotype I created with Mill Creek (see fig. 11). This proved a pivotal moment in how the process could keep on developing. In this particular process, Figure 11 Neal, Sam. Cyanotype. 2020 Mill Creek, BC, Canada. 37 the Mill Creek piece was the first I had created – by not fixing – during the colder weather. Although it was only October, the snow had settled on the ground, and the temperature hovered around zero degrees. I chose to use a single piece of sensitized paper so that I could lean over the creek and let the water run over a portion of it. One of the interesting factors to this piece was the direction of the water flow. The water from the lakes would usually impact the paper, and I would feel its force against my body. In this piece, the water pulled the material downstream, resulting in me feeling nature work differently. This can be seen in figure twelve. Due to colder weather and less ultraviolet light, the transformation of the cyanotype was slower. The colder the weather, the longer the print will take to dry, and the less ultraviolet light there is, the longer it will take for the cyanotype to react with available light. Similarly, a photograph captured in a darker environment will need a longer exposure time. The Kalamalka piece, in contrast, in figure ten, had a very different reaction to the Figure 12 Neal, Sam. Video still. 2020 Mill Creek, BC, Canada. 38 Mill Creek piece made in the cold fall weather concerning colour, time and transformation. I spent an hour photographing the Mill Creek piece, then left for three hours before returning and collecting it. The weak ultraviolet light and overhanging trees that shaded the site enabled me to let the work sit for a while and leave it to transform and dry slowly. I employed depth of field in this piece (see fig. 13) while photographing it. The creases in the paper, caused by the interaction with water, and laying it on uneven ground, enabled me to treat the cyanotype as a landscape from a different perspective. I also laid on the ground while I photographed the cyanotype, which opened up a new way of experiencing the transformation. The sense of scale became blurred, and the perspective from which I photographed implied distance. By laying on the ground, the performative relationship between the artwork and the environment is enhanced. It does not simply stop once the water has impacted the paper. It continues when I photograph the cyanotype during its Figure 13 Neal, Sam. Digital Photograph. 2020 Mill Creek, BC, Canada. 39 exposure. The cyanotype, in turn, performs for me while I observe and compose a narrative of the transformation using my camera. Figure fourteen shows the same cyanotype as figure thirteen. However, I photographed from a different perspective. Figure thirteen represents a landscape as if photographed horizontally with bodies of water in the foreground and mountains in the background. In contrast, figure fourteen is captured from a bird’s eye perspective, and shows water flowing over portions of the paper, becoming a representation of a waterway paving itself across the landscape. The untouched parts of the paper (not exposed to water) form shapes and pathways for the water to move around. Experiencing the slower transformation of the cyanotype reflected the calmness of the water that flowed down the creek. In contrast, in the Kalamalka piece (see fig.10), the photograph can reflect the rapid change and intense heat in the textures and colours present in the photograph. Figure 14 Neal, Sam. Digital Photograph. 2020 Mill Creek, BC, Canada. 40 Developing concepts and reflecting on past experiences is a part of the process. The experience of photographing the inky pool (see fig. 15) that the paper collected reminded me of when I experienced the aurora borealis. The colours and textures that formed allowed me to experience what was happening on the paper, and they also acted as a portal to another memory. The meeting between me and the creek at this particular moment allowed for this experience to happen. 4.2 Screenprinting. This section will discuss my relationship with printmaking and how I incorporate screenprinting into my artistic process. I will also discuss how I thread together the making of work inside a studio and its relationship to the work made on-site. I began screenprinting in September 2020. I initially screenprinted photographs I had taken during the cyanotypes’ exposure. I was able to carry on the process, from the fixed photograph to developing a print in the studio. I learned that I had to detach myself Figure 15 Neal, Sam. Digital Photograph. 2020 Mill Creek, BC, Canada. 41 from the photograph and not see the screenprint process as a means of reproduction but to allow the piece to develop in its own way. The cyanotype process and printmaking, respectively, take on their own visual process that I cannot wholly control. When I print, for example, the first four CMYK layers, which stands for: cyan, magenta, yellow, black, I would get a general idea of how the colours work together. Think of it like a RAW photographic file or a film negative that has just been scanned. At first, the colours appear flat, and I need to edit them to achieve the desired outcome. To develop the print further, I printed separate layers over sections where creases in the paper had created shadows and I mixed different colours to show a stronger dynamic range in the screenprint. In its final state, the print would not necessarily be as detailed as the photographic version. Still, it would have more depth due to the ink sitting on top of the paper, creating shadows and becoming closer to the details in the original cyanotype. Due to the limitations that I had with printing at a large enough size to become a bodily experience with the viewer, I decided to print digitally at a larger scale, approximately twenty by thirty inches and rework the images through screen printing over the digital prints. This was partly because of an exhibition I held at the Alternator Centre in January 2021 called Inland Waters. In the exhibition, I printed photographs on matte paper and mounted them to foam-core. While the prints were engaging from a distance, as I approached them closer, there was a lack of depth and texture within them. They lacked a strong relationship with the original cyanotypes in the space. The water that I captured in the photograph had the same matte surface as the rest of the print, blending into one another and appearing flat. 42 I looked at the screenprints I had been working on and noticed that the wetter elements within the prints (the parts where water had pooled) had a glossiness to them. So, I decided that rather than screenprinting photographs of the cyanotypes in their entirety, I could print over the portions that had water within them, reactivating the water and my memory of the experience photographing the cyanotype. At first, blending the screen-printed water into the digital print was of concern. However, with a combination of digital editing and exposing the screens to light at different intensities, I was able to blend the water seamlessly into the print's surface. Figure 16 Neal, Sam. Digital Photograph. 2021 Lake Country, BC, Canada. 43 Figure sixteen shows two photographic screenprints that depict the transformation of a cyanotype during its exposure at Wood Lake, BC. The top photographic screenprint was captured three minutes into the exposure, and the bottom photographic screenprint was capture one hour and eleven minutes into the exposure of the cyanotype. By photographing the same area of the cyanotype while it was exposing, I was able to fix the transformation using photography and then use a combination of digital and screenprinting to create the final print. Although I calculated this exposure and transformation in hours and minutes – a short time in relation to the landscape's history – there becomes a representation of geological time within the work, especially when the screenprints and cyanotypes are seen within the same space and form a dialogue. Although the cyanotype is small compared to the landscape in which it was created, the medium collapses or instead focuses a section of geological time into an art object. The experimental and performative nature of meeting the water cross-pollinates with the screenprinting process. The screen’s exposure, flooding, pulling the squeegee and lifting the screen to see how each layer transforms the image is experimental, further developing the process. 44 Chapter 5: Reflection. How I experience place and respond to the environment through artmaking has changed over the last couple of years. At first, I was responding to place through a photographic lens, one that I would use to attempt to depict ‘Nature’ and arrive at a vantage point that seemed to overlook a landscape. Ansel Adams was an early influence in my practice as a photographer in terms of composition and pre-visualization. Adams visualized the final print before he captured Monolith, The Face of Half Dome. He decided to add a dark red filter to his camera lens to dramatically darken the sky and lighten the rock face to describe it in the way he felt during that experience. This became a part of his methodology: to see the outcome before taking a photograph. However, after responding to landscape in a similar way in my early research, I was unsatisfied with my process. I felt that my photographs became a visual cliché and so I began to integrate a tangible and embodied approach to my artistic practice. The cyanotype process became an experience that incorporated ecology and a bodily experience with the environment. On the other hand, like myself, David Hockney became receptive to his surroundings and looked for new ways of seeing place. The exploration into the concept of time and space is seen in many of David Hockney’s works. One of his pieces that pushes the boundaries of this is his polaroid collage: Noya and Bill Brandt with self-portrait. The collage shows a figure of Brandt with multiple sets of hands and there are some self-portrait polaroids of Hockney placed on the floor, one of which is undeveloped. The viewer knows that Brandt does not have this number of hands but Hockney is instead playing with the concept of time and space. Each aspect of the collage has a visual 45 narrative that explores time and space. The undeveloped polaroid suggests impermanence; however, the viewer knows that a photograph would have been revealed on the polaroid. This part of the collage becomes part of the mystery for the viewer. Hockney chose to freeze that moment using photography, challenging the notion of time through photographic cubism, and leaving the polaroid to the viewer’s imagination. The desire to be immersed within Hockney’s landscape paintings resonates with me too. He moved far from his home in England to California. Moving into an unfamiliar landscape, yet one that brought clarity and a sense of belonging. In my process, while I do not feel I belong in the sense of ownership, I do feel grounded and able to be a practicing artist working within the landscape for my mental wellbeing. In the many paintings of swimming pools by Hockney, one that stands out for me is the Portrait of an Artist (Pool with Two Figures). The refracted light shapes the swimming pool’s water, and he paints a reflection of the desire to be in the California sun. The picturesque landscape invites me to step into the blue swimming pool, to go over the edge of the swimming pool and into the distant blue mountains. Would I be where I am today if I didn’t take the Belonging to the Lookout photograph? No, however, I recognize that my methodology has evolved into a more enriching experience by learning about my place within the environment. I participated in a process with the environment, and I managed to share this experience with the local community. Alongside my exhibition held at the Lake Country Art Gallery, I decided to share my experience of using cyanotype with the local community. I wanted to engage my community in the gallery space and in the artmaking process itself, inviting people to view 46 my work and participate in its making. I made packages available for the community to pick up at The Lake Country Art Gallery. The package contains two sheets of cyanotype paper protected in a light-proof envelope and instructions for participants. The instructions describe the process concerning how I collaborate with the bodies of water I encounter. Although these are instructions, I should note that this process embodies chance and serendipity. For a fuller experience, the participant might open themselves up to their surroundings during the process. Like the process itself, I cannot control how the participant chooses to use the package, nor can I fully control the cyanotype process when I meet the water. However, the physical and tangible experience that the community has the opportunity to engage with, can not only help them understand the cyanotype process but the experience may also improve their outlook on their environment. My aim in inviting them into the process is to enable them to think about their impact on the natural environment and its impact on their mental wellbeing. One of the pivotal moments in my research was to leave the cyanotype unfixed. By not fixing, I enable the viewer to see these macro-scientific observations of the work. The original cyanotypes are in the gallery space for the viewer to see the bacteria and sediment that will grow and decay on the object's surface. I create a pathway, enabling the viewer to navigate the water bodies, presented in a similar form that they were exposed during the process of their making, draped from the ceiling, laid on the ground, or viewed from above. The framed pieces allow the viewer to have a bodily experience with the cyanotype. The viewer can approach them from a distance and then look at the smaller details in the print. The cyanotypes become image-objects that live alongside the photographic screenprints. The screenprints have become part of my methodology in 47 developing the process and continuing the transformation of the cyanotype. I am the image-maker in the photographic screenprint. Thus, the print represents my observations during the initial exposure, a 'moment in time' that I responded to by using digital photography and further developed into a screenprint. It is reproducible, whereas the original cyanotype exists as a living object, susceptible to growth and decay. In the exhibition, we (the viewer) become witnesses to a physical and chemical process resulting from a directly informed decision between myself and the environment. Location and time are also recorded and exhibited alongside the artworks. The video displayed in the gallery space adds context to the process I participate in and also acts as an artist statement. By acknowledging ‘Nature’ as a collaborator, I think viewers in the gallery and viewers that participate in the cyanotype process itself, might see their surroundings differently. The approach in my methodology has developed since I placed the usnea on the sensitized paper to reference an observation of place. The work now embodies the unknown, chance, and serendipity. Water, for me, has become a space for reflection, a space in which I use the cyanotype process where the object and the abstract meet. I have learned that the process has many variables and that collaborating with the environment cannot be fully controlled, nor do I want it to be. Rebecca Solnit notes: How do you calculate upon the unforeseen? It seems to be an art of recognizing the role of the unforeseen, of keeping your balance amid surprises, of collaborating with chance, of recognizing that there are some essential mysteries in the world and thereby a limit to calculation, to plan, to control. To calculate on the unforeseen 48 is perhaps exactly the paradoxical operation that life most requires of us. (Solnit 5-6) I can only anticipate that something unexplainable may happen when I meet the water, and I embrace this part of the process, which constitutes a form of collaboration. I situate this body of work and the process as a form of collaboration with the landscape. Again, it can be unexplainable, and for the few variables I put in place, the result of the work becomes impacted by its environment, and a transformational experience occurs. I am continuing to work with cyanotype, and I hope to involve the local community in workshops that inform the cyanotype process and the bodies of water in the Okanagan. 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Thesis/Dissertation
eng
Visual Arts
Vancouver : University of British Columbia Library
Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
Graduate
Kenney, Denise
Responding to landscape
Text