Desiccated Portfolio
Things unseen into things known - a portfolio of normally overlooked objects
Desiccated Sun Burst
Mahogany Nut
Spiral
Death Star Two Helicon
Flying
Black Holes
Mandala
Ginger Lilly
Black Eyed Susan
Curly Seed Pod Urano Print
Grapes
Ladder
The Wind
Sculptural Leaf
Two Sprigs
Three Clusters
Contrapposto
Death Star
Crystal Fountain Cane Arrow
Wild Cotton
Aria
Platinum Palladium Prints and Uranotype Prints are available starting at $2600.00 depending on the size and edition number.
About the Desiccated Gallery Images
Most people overlook, literally do not see, these very small, dried, “desiccated” objects. I realized, over 15 years ago, that the miraculous resided in the mundane, that William Blake was right when he said one could see, “…heaven in a wild flower, hold infinity in the palm of your hand and eternity in an hour”. So my quest was to transform unseen subjects into things known. The majority of these objects are no larger than one inch. These things are what they are but, by being so greatly magnified, they become something else, something “suggestive”, in all of the emotional, sensual, and sexual connotations of that word.
The subtle chamois color of the dried objects so closely resembles the color of platinum-palladium prints in most cases. In a few others, the warm red color of the subject very closely matches the ox blood or old burgundy color of uranotype prints. All of these very large prints resonate with the original subjects but have become new and unique objects in their own right.
I handmade all of these prints, starting with 100% cotton paper (COT 320 for pt/pd and Hahnemühle Platinum Rag for uranotypes) which I then hand coated with expensive, toxic, and ultraviolet sensitive chemistry for each process. As these are contact-printing only processes, I made a digitally enlarged negative the size of each finished print. After exposure through the negative to an intense source of UV radiation, each print was hand processed in the appropriate chemistry, carefully washed, and air dried.
The craft and technology used to make these prints span three centuries! Platinum-palladium printing was patented in the late 1870s, the Plate Burner UV exposure unit is 20th century and the digital camera, image processing software, and Epson printer used to make the enlarged negatives are 21st century!
Thank you for viewing my work….
About the Platinum Palladium Prints and Uranotype Prints
“The Platinum-palladium printing process was patented in the late 1870s making the craft and technology used to make these prints more than 100 years old. Each print was handmade, starting with 100% cotton paper (COT 320 for pt/pd and Hahnemühle Platinum Rag for Uranotypes) which I then hand coated with expensive, toxic, and ultraviolet sensitive chemistry for each process. As these are contact-printing only processes, I made a digitally enlarged negative the size of each finished print. After exposure through the negative to an intense source of UV radiation, each print was hand processed in the appropriate chemistry, carefully washed, and air-dried.”
“Uranotype prints make use of the photo sensitive properties of uranyl nitrate. They were very popular during the second half of the 19th century because their warm old rose color was flattering for portraits. Like many of the other hand-made printing processes, uranotypes fell from popularity when factory-made photo printing paper became widely available.”