What happens when you pay attention? For the span of one month in summer, I collected an invasive species of water plant, soaked it in cyanotype chemistry and captured an essence of image and water on film. I had never worked at this scale before, so for much of the project I felt I was stumbling through the unknown, blindly surrendering to whatever fortune or accident would bestow. Water Thyme was created in direct sunlight with varied exposure times, at the mercy of whatever each day brought me.

The language of photography is about relationships of light and dark. Water and time are related too, frozen water expands like time and time like water has a boiling point. By using film for this series, a new reality appears revealing a shadow world. The resulting images are an exploration of absence/ presence and also a reverie of an invisible world. They are blind compositions as the project is left open to intuition. During the long exposures, it felt a bit like time, like water, can be stolen. Heightened attention through stillness and a focus on increments of time inspired ideas about awareness. This series tells a subtle yet universal story contemplating fear, loss and our place in the universe.

For several years, I have been making abstract photograms of materials found in nature. Water Thyme is another name for Hydrilla, one of the most invasive aquatic species in Lake Cayuga, Ithaca, NY. Into the Wild is both a non-fiction book and adventure film with a soundtrack by Eddie Vedder as his debut solo album. Big Hard Sun is the top hit from this album. Lyrics to this song reference the consequences of human actions when at odds with nature and accepting the hard truths of life. Hydrilla has some biological benefits but is notorious for creating dense mats that choke out native plants and cause fish kills. To go “into the wild” is to experience life but also to flirt with death.

What might that look like? Almost all my work begins with language rather than optics. Water Thyme is a site specific installation made in Ithaca, NY activated by access to the factory space at The Soil Factory and vast expanses of Hydrilla spreading throughout Lake Cayuga. Fear sets a narrative for any invasive species, especially one that can grow on average over an inch per day. Each section of this series is a reflection of time, place, weather and photo alchemy as imagery develops, slowly or quickly, in the variegated light of the sun.

Solar Snapshot is the working title of my latest camera less photography images. I use black and white silver gelatin photography paper, plant material and sunlight to capture ethereal images floating in color fields created by chemistry of plant material laid onto the paper and exposure in sunlight. When the UV index is high with little cloud cover images appear very quickly. A snapshot is an informal photograph taken quickly as well as a recording of a place or situation. These prints are fugitive image captures of sun and location which will vanish over time unless I wash the prints in a bath of photography fixer. Instead of using a fixer bath I scan my images, then store in a dark location. I know they will vanish over time which is fine as part of my process is to accept transformation as inevitable. I am astonished by how much color can be coaxed from black and white paper, a metaphor for how nothing needs to be absolute, and change is always possible.

I’m always interested in alternative photography lenses for digital camera bodies. My zone plate lens is of particular interest since it creates a flare around the object being photographed. Make Some Friends grew out of an idea to use Victorian flatware to make stick figures. I construct the figures using found flatware from various sources. In the nineteenth century there were many fashionable foods and a special utensil for each one. A tiny ladle for the perfect dollop of mustard or a miniature lettuce fork are not widely used today. It was not polite to touch food with fingers so special spoons would be provided for a dessert bonbon or mint as well. A variety of tongs was required for foods such as asparagus, sugar cubes and petit-four pastry.

Due to 2020/2021 global pandemic it has been difficult to see friends in real time. These portraits of small figures made of flatware components from another era glow due to refracted light from thousands of little scratches in the metal. They are somewhat otherworldly due to halos created by the zone plate lens. My new friends are engaging in their robotic form and strangely comforting to construct. This work speaks to a world where we are all becoming more familiar with small robots and less human contact. Some robots today are creations that mimic life and are helpful as companions. Using old world components to create twentieth century friends brings old objects to new life in a friendly form glowing up at me.