Meet the “Alchemists”

Lynette Arnold:

Always the photographer at family gatherings, I took up the challenge of black and white photography when I was forced to abandon ceramics for a year or so. Having found an old enlarger, I set up my first darkroom in the late 1980s. But it was not until around 2000 that I could devote more time to photography, and except for a few short breaks, have been completely obsessed with the medium ever since.
I continue to use film, both for silver gelatin printing and as a source of negatives for scanning to produce an enlarged digital negative for contact printing. But for some genres, particularly still life, I tend to capture the image digitally.My subject matter ranges from still life to architecture and ‘street’.
“Alternative” processes are challenging and take time, but are immensely rewarding both for the artist and the viewer. It is not only the art of photography, but the craft of photography that is such an integral part of older techniques. Ellie Young from Gold Street Studios has been my knowledge source and my inspiration. She has such passion for and knowledge of the foundations of the photography that has given us such a rich heritage.

You can contact Lyn for purchases or commissions here

John Bardell:

I have a long-standing passion for photography and the visual arts. I have studied print-making with various Sydney visual artists and enjoy experimenting with 19th century photographic printing processes such as cyanotype, Van Dyke Brown and gum dichromate printing. I see an exciting future in the melding of traditional and digital photography with these historic processes and traditional print-making techniques to imbue images with a very real ambiance of time and place.

You can contact John for purchases or commissions here.

Susan Buchanan:

Passion for photography hit my psyche with such force, that it feels like there was no ‘before’. Its tendrils took hold in the darkroom and have continued to lure me back there. The marriage between the art and craft of photography, between vision and technique, between the new and the old and the possibilities this unleashes, unveils, gives me the opening to present myself to the world.

You can contact Susan for purchases or commissions here

Carolyn Pettigrew:

I started into my photographic journey developing 120 film and making contact prints in my parents bathroom. I discovered the challenge of dark room photography at university. Self-taught with the usual bravado of the young I worked for a student newspaper and magazine as a photographer.
It wasn’t until digital came along that I revived my interest in photography and started to look into the history of photography and the work of the great men and women of the art – Julia Margaret Cameron, Gertrude Kasebier, Imogen Cunningham, Lee Miller among many others. The greats I admire most almost all worked in monochrome.
I also like creating works on paper so it seemed a natural progression for me to go back to the earliest days of photography and print making with one foot in the darkroom to where I am now with alternative processes.

You can contact Carolyn for purchases or commissions here