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Christine SoSea Cliffs Diptych II ( Pair abstract cyanotypes each framed to 25 x 15)2023
2023
About the Item
Though it resembles a giant abstract watercolor painting owing to its soft gradations and luminous quality, this is a form of photography called a cyanotype, photogram or sun print. This is a multiple-exposure lensless photograph or abstract cyanotype.
In the artist's words:
"My technique is a form of experimental action photography, like the action painters Morris Louis or Jackson Pollock. My abstract cyanotypes appear luminous like watercolor paintings but are actually photographs. I start by coating paper in a dark room with the same photography chemicals used to print a cyanotype from a photo negative. But I use no photo negative, no stencil, and no solid objects to create my patterns. The abstract design is a multiple-exposure photograph made through my deliberate movements and covering and uncovering of the light-sensitive paper during its exposure to light. Different sections of the paper were exposed to light longer, which yields darker and lighter shades of blue. The areas left uncovered longer are darker blue.
I have devised my own method of printing abstract cyanotypes using water’s surface as a solid object to block light, letting the sun etch the lines where one shade ends and a new one begins. I work quickly with a design in mind beforehand. I form subtle gradations of darkening blue as I submerge the light-sensitive paper for carefully timed exposures under water, counting the seconds in my head, turning, bending and lifting the paper and holding it still as long as needed to shape the lines and then have them etched permanent by the sun’s light. I do not merely stand at the surf’s edge and wait to see what the water does. I control the water’s movement and my own. Through extensive practice, I am able to control much of the intended pattern, but when working with moving water under severe time constraints the number of variables cannot all be controlled
EACH panel of this pair titled ‘Sea Cliffs 4’ and ‘Sea Cliffs 5’ is framed in an 15w x 25.5h" slim white metal frame with a white mat.
DIMENSIONS: The left panel is 12 x 23” framed to 15 x 25.5”. And the right panel is 12 x 23” framed to 15 x 25.5”. Together they are 25.5 " high x 30" wide without a gap but should be hung with a gap of 2 inches, making the pair 32 inches across.
Each abstract cyanotype is entirely unique. These exact lines, shapes and shades of blue cannot be recreated as the exposure of the paper was heavily manipulated by me during each printing.
A traditional single-exposure cyanotype yields a white silhouette against a dark blue background. But instead of creating a white image by blocking light with solid objects on the light-sensitive paper, I used water to block the light, creating subtle gradations of darkening blue as I submerged the light-sensitive paper for different carefully timed exposures under water.
- Creator:Christine So (1970, American)
- Creation Year:2023
- Dimensions:Height: 25.5 in (64.77 cm)Width: 30 in (76.2 cm)Depth: 1 in (2.54 cm)
- Medium:
- Movement & Style:
- Period:
- Condition:
- Gallery Location:Oakland, CA
- Reference Number:1stDibs: LU2737217304962
Christine So
Christine So is an American printmaker, photographer and painter living in the hills across the bay from her hometown, San Francisco. She is best known for her blue and white cyanotype photographs of forests shrouded in fog. The Foggy Woods series is ever-growing as the artist continually hikes these hills which are often foggy at dawn. She explores radically different ways to use this antique photographic medium with and without out a camera. At times her blue prints look like screen prints. At others like abstract watercolors. Besides printing photographs from negatives, botanicals using entire branches, altering the chemical recipe to obtain novel colors, and creating abstract cyanotypes of deliberate patterns, she also paints images using the light-sensitive solution and prints a pattern within them. These last works she calls “cyanotype paintings”. The multiple-day process depends on being able to see while painting in a dark room so as to not expose the light-sensitive painted silhouette before it’s time. She named her series of botanical paintings which have a fine blue and white pattern “Delft Garden” after the Dutch painted porcelain. Clients include: Timothée Chalamet, Starbucks, Mayo Clinic (Jacksonville), Jumaira Resort, Lux Habitat Sotheby’s International (Dubai), Wyndham Worldmark Hotels, Kimpton Hotel Monaco (Salt Lake City) , Mazars Accounting, Limelight Hotel Mammoth (California), MD Anderson Hospital (Houston), Oncology Center, Houston Methodist Hospital.
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