What Pushes Through
I collected the weeds I passed on that Monday. The ones that push through the paving stones, through the concrete, through the brick walls. The ones that thrive among the litter and the dog shit.
I made phytograms using the plants themselves as a natural developer by soaking the weeds and then laying them directly onto the film and paper in broad daylight.
Read my article published on 35mmc here
35mm film phytogram, animated
The plants
Weeds. We try to eradicate them from our gardens and streets. Some plants need to be babied and cared for but, quite the opposite, weeds withstand persistent attempts to kill them, coming back again and again. They’re the tough guys, the anarchists.
The process
I made phytograms using the plants themselves as a natural developer by soaking the weeds and then laying them directly onto the film and paper in broad daylight.
Phytograms on Kodak Technical Pan 35mm black & white film from around 2001
Phytograms on 1990s resin-coated paper
Phytograms on Kodak Plus-X 120 black & white film from around 2004
This project was exhibited in the Lawless Imagination exhibition at RuptureXIBIT in December 2023. The animation was projected on a large underground cinema screen and the rolls of film were shown alongside it displayed in a box of soil that they had been buried in for 6 weeks.
