In 1842, sixteen years after the first photograph, Sir John Herschel discovered that the solution of Ammonium Iron (III) Citrate and Potassium Ferricyanide in water is photosensitive. This discovery was entirely academic until his friend and fellow scientist Anna Atkins produced British Algae: Cyanotype Impressions, which documented plants by cyanotype impression and was the first book illustrated entirely with photographically produced images.

Quickly adpoted for proofs and offset printing it was the most cost-effective method for copying drawings for many years. It was in this usage in which use it became known as a blue print. With the slow death of mainstream traditional photography and the use of xerox and other duplication methods replacing the blue print the method is now considered an alternative process and relegated to the history books and a select number of modern artists continuing to explore this simple, archival, beautiful process.

Digital Photography removes the physical interaction that a photographer has traditionally had with his medium. In the past, darkening an area of a photograph meant dipping your hands in and out of the stream of light that poured from an enlarger to the photographic paper below. Now that hand dance is replaced by a few clicks of a mouse. As a high-end digital retoucher I know that a digital workflow offers infitinitly more control and precision than its darkroom ancestor. But there are still times that I yearn for the direct connection to my work that comes from traditional photography.

It was this yearning that first led me to cyanotypes. I take great joy in the simplicty of the process: only two chemicals, sun, and water are needed to form a beautiful image that will be around long after I am gone. With cyanotypes I am able to refind the primal joy of the darkroom, creating with your hands rather than working through a computer. All this, without the staining smell of Dektol or Fixer; it hardly seems fair!

Example Cyanotypes will be placed here.