Bones project is inspired by the ‘straight photography‘ movement of Alfred Stieglitz, Edward Weston and Ansel Adams. Subjects are photographed at a close distance, on an overall blank or empty background, to show their shape and structure. The beauty of the subject itself makes the picture.
Bones project is made on tintype, ambrotype and alternative processes prints. This album page is about one specific alternative process.
All photos of this project are shot on a wet plate collodion negative, a process rooted at the dawn of photography, on the year 1851. The negatives are made on glass plates of 30×40 cm size (12×16″). Such a negative is then printed on various alternative photographic techniques such as cyanotype, Van Dyke brown and salted paper. All these photographic processes are also rooted at the dawn of the photographic printing process, just before the advent of silver gelatine.
The three – cyanotypes, Van Dyke brown prints and salt prints – are all printed on unseized Rosaspina paper, a museum-quality paper from the Italian paper mill Fabriano. That process renders a coarse grain surface, as rough as raw paper. The image looks printed inside the fibers of the paper, as it is indeed. The prints undergo their specific archival processing. Cyanotypes have their own procedure to follow, which differs from the one required by Van Dykes and salt papers. Van Dyke Brown, salt prints and kallitypes undergo a specific toning, usually with gold chloride, for maximum archival stability.
Prints are finished with a protective layer of Renaissance wax and trademarked with press seal.
The photos of this gallery are mounted on a floating black board which is not part of the project itself, so it is not shown in full on purpose. You can check the floating frame of my personal concept on the Shop page, along with the prints ready for sale.
This is a work in progress. Check in again to see new entries. Thanks.