Mollified Venice presents: Fluid Matter – Humanature

Synopsis:

Combining glass and light has been part of my oeuvre for a long time. 

During the madness of lockdown in the Covid years I started exploring analogue photographic processes through which I focused on pinhole photography. 

As a cold-worker I have always been intrigued by the optics of glass, and my adventures with this primitive pinhole photographic style inspired a way to combine both of my loves. 

Various “lenses” that slide into the cardboard chamber of the camera were made. Each lens is different. 

For this exhibition I am showing the “Bottle Lens” and resulting image. I used a coke bottle, cut and mounted on sheet glass as a filter between the tiny aperture and photographic paper. 

The results are quite exciting and mostly unpredictable. 

This work can be seen as comment on our oversaturated, digital lives. 

I love this meditative process of making images — from cutting and preparing the lenses, to loading the camera (I can only take one image at a time), going out and setup, opening the shutter (for ca. 6 minutes), returning to the darkroom and develop the image. So much can happen during this time and each result is an exciting surprise. 

Lothar Böttcher