Darkened Room Photogram Print in Matt Paper
Darkened Room Photogram Print in Matt Paper
The prints are photograms. They are not really photographs, rather a photocopy, a scan or a trace. They are 1:1 scale negative records of a shadow. The photogram is an image made without a camera, made instead by placing objects onto light-sensitive paper and exposing it to light.
The photograms have to be made in total darkness because the colour darkroom is so sensitive to light. Light passes through the glass fans, casting their shadows onto the light-sensitive paper below. The fans act as if they are a camera, focusing, refracting and playing with light. I rely on touch to place each fan, feeling the corners of the paper to guide their position. Darkness changes how we experience space - it can feel vast or constricted, disorientating or peaceful.
The colours in the prints are made using the colour filters of the enlarger, adding and subtracting one from the other until I reach the colour I’m happy with. In the colour darkroom we work with the negative; any colour I change in the enlarger casts its opposite. Every print is unique, each with its own angle, tilt, and placement. The prints are as much about surrendering control as they are about the freedom found within the containment of a small darkened room.
The darkroom is the blind spot within a club, where people can explore the depths of their inhibitions. It is also where analogue photographic processes are developed. These darkened spaces explore the negative—the side less visible to the naked eye, whose inner experience cannot be easily translated into the outer world. They are places where we can lose track of time and care less about how something looks and more about how it feels.
Please note these are experimentation prints so some may have dust marks, red visible light colour bleeds or slight wrinkling in the paper. Each photogram is taken individually so they differ in position and exposure.
12” x 16”
Unframed