The colors of Black and White

After a few months of moving between the darkroom and the ‘wet studio’ - “Meeting Frida”, a new body of work is ready!

I wrote about the beginning of this work in a previous blog post http://www.amykankaphotography.com/blog/2018/11/7/frida-and-me

And here is a peek at the process of creating the images in this series. After the initial exposure and developer step in the darkroom, the wet image moves to a light filled studio where I paint chemicals on the light sensitive black and white paper, watching colors emerge. Despite the fact that I know the science behind it, still feeling I am witnessing magic. Painting with light …. there is nothing like it!!

You can see the full portfolio here: http://www.amykankaphotography.com/meeting-frida

Painting on Silver Gelatin paper - shades of gold, pink, amber and red slowly emerging

Is it done, shall I leave it longer? ….many prints are messed up before a good one emerges …

Looking great when wet, this one did not make it to the final images when dry :(

End of a working day, many failures, one success!!

Like a river

Five bottles and an arrangement of weeds

The very first image I created in the darkroom was a photogram (image created by placing objects directly on photographic paper - no camera involved). This was the winter semester at SMC (Santa Monica College) in 2016, and we spent the mornings, 3-4 days a week in the darkroom. I remember thinking I could play with photograms forever, but of course after one week we moved on and there was never time to go back and play. The second semester, in the advanced darkroom class I saw my first Lith print and it was love at first sight. The silent waiting for the image to emerge, watching the developer tray for 5, 10 minutes, sometimes more, not really knowing what will appear. The closest thing to magic I ever experienced.

When we returned to Israel, we improvised a home darkroom (my pedantic French professor from Photo 1 would kill me if he saw it ...). Part in the studio, part in the bathroom, moving between the rooms with prints in a light proof bag....unconventional - but it works. There was nothing preventing me from playing with photograms now ....but I didn't. Waiting for "interesting" ideas meant I was doing nothing. A few months ago I placed a few weeds collected on the morning walk in a set of 5 small glass bottle, and I remember thinking this may be nice to photograph. Yesterday, after finishing the initial Lith print tests of two new images, I grabbed the bottles and placed them under the enlarger. Why not try? And here it is, at long last, a Lith photogram. Unforced, unrestrained, unpredictable, unique. Reality as real as it gets, yet unrecognizable despite the fact we look at it daily. "The only journey is the one within" said Rilke long time ago, could this be the start of a new one for me?

Writing with light

I have been photographing for two and a half years now. Have a great digital camera, good lenses. Got better at composing an image, at processing it....and yet, I never really understood what photography is. "Writing with light". Using light to turn a blank piece of paper into a printed image. Watching the image appearing on the paper, not line by line as it is spit out by the printer, but slowly taking shape under the yellow darkroom lights. Dodging and burning are no longer done by hitting a key on the computer. They shed their digital guise and return to their origin - manipulating light in order to shape the image. 

Six weeks in the darkroom, four days a week, three hours a day. Does is always work as I want it to? Nope. Can I better control the image digitally? You bet I can. But if you had a pill you could take instead of eating your favorite sushi. Faster, more efficient, same nutritional value, would you go for it?  

The true alchemists do not change lead into gold, they change words. Sometimes, they use light to change it into images. Pure magic.

Light and shadows on Santa Monica promenade