The Dried Down Toned Kallitype Prints

If you play with the technical end of photography enough, you can get exactly what you’re after. After a few months dialing in what I want, I think I’ve found the magic recipe and the prints are exactly what I want for this work. I wish you see them IRL - in real life. I apologize for the iPhone snaps, but that’s the best I can do for now. One day, some of you might be able to see the entire body of work in an exhibition. We’ll see what happens!

Prickly Pear Catci Patch and Aspen Growing Out of Granite

It’s a difficult task to make work that’s original and authentic. Not allowing the “outside noise” to come in and influence you is also a chore. Influence is incessant. It can be a good thing, but mostly it’s not. Copying or emulating someone or some style is fine as an exercise to work toward something of your own. To live in that space and constantly mimic or replicate work that has already been done is derivative. And that’s not good.

So how do you overcome this problem? The way I do it is to write about my project, think (deeply) about my work, and spend time observing the land, the objects, and the places that I want to make images of - that includes light, directions, perspectives, etc. I get an image in my mind that is directly correlated and supported by the narrative of the work, and I make plates until I have something I want to print. My photographs are loaded with metaphors. It takes time to really observe them and understand what I’m saying non-verbally. I spend a lot of time working out ideas and trying my best to include things that cannot be written about.

I enjoyed undergraduate and graduate school because there were like-minded people I could share work and get feedback from. Work shouldn’t be made in a vacuum; it’s should be made with constructive feedback from people you trust. And even then, the feedback should be taken with caveats. Another reason to reach out and communicate is connection. People that share common interests can turn you on to writers, books, film, and art of all disciplines that may help you find your way through your project. This kind of influence can be good if it’s taken with limitations.

THE PRICKLY PEAR CACTUS
Prickly pear fruit and nopales were used by Native Americans to treat a variety of physical ailments. Nopales in particular were split and applied to open wounds on both humans and animals. Roasted nopales were held on the side of the neck or below the chin to treat rheumatism and mumps. Spines from prickly pear pads were commonly used as needles by many tribes. The deep reds and purples of the tunas were extracted as juice and used to dye textiles.

The Great Mullein Flowering & Aspen Trees

THE GREAT MULLEIN (IN FLOWER)
Many tribes employed the use of mullein leaf tea for coughs, colds, and rheumatism. They considered it to be analgesic, anti-inflammatory, antispasmodic, and expectorant. The astringent and demulcent properties of the leaf tea were found useful in cases of diarrhea.

I’m working hard to dial in what I want to do when it comes to making my prints. I know I vacillate a lot on what I want these images to end up as; i.e. what kind of printing process I want to use and how they are presented in the end. It’s not a question of cost or time or anything that might be inconvenient. It’s simply a matter of aesthetics.

As of today, I think I’ve committed to the toned Kallitype print. The reason for this is twofold; first, and foremost the color, or color control. I am enamored with the red tones I can get. They are representative of this area, the Utes called this area, “Red Mother Earth.” And they really have a dream-like, historic quality.

Some of the prints I’ve made lately remind me of Edward Curtis’s POP prints. Warm and gorgeous. So, bottom line is that this workflow allows me to stay consistent and achieve what I want for this project. It goes to show that you always want to remain open in the discovery phase of a project. Being dead-set on something can really pull the work down and possibly even make it fail. When I started this project, almost a year ago now, I never thought I would end up printing toned Kallitypes from my negatives. Never say never!

You can start to see where I’m going with the work - although the printing processes are different, the matching and diptychs possibilities are there. The Aspen cut I photographed last week, matches up well with this image.

3 ASPEN TREES & 3 FLOWERS
Native Americans heavily relied on aspen, It was a great source of food, medicine, and wood for them. Many medicinal uses relied on the presence of salicin and populin, two precursors of aspirin that are present to some degree in all members of the genus Populus.

Aspen Tress - Looking East, Toward Tava (Sun Mountain)

ASPEN TREE

Native Americans heavily relied on aspen, It was a great source of food, medicine, and wood for them. Many medicinal uses relied on the presence of salicin and populin, two precursors of aspirin that are present to some degree in all members of the genus Populus.

White Sage & Blue Grama Grass

WHITE SAGE
White sage is used in many Native American or Indigenous cultures. Usually known as “smudging sage”. It has been used traditionally to purify the mind, body, and spirit before praying. Native Americans also used white sage in ceremonies of birth and death. Sacred objects such as pipes and eagle feathers were passed through the smoking of burning white sage in order to purify them.

BLUE GRAMA GRASS
It can be ground into a powder, mixed with water, and eaten as a mush, often with corn meal. It is also used to make bread. It is also an important grazing food for mule deer, elk, and bison all of which the Ute/Tabeguache hunted and relied on for food, shelter, and tools.

The lenses I’m using for this project. From left to right; Dallmeyer 3B (290mm f/3), Derogy (220mm f/2.8), and a Derogy Fab 2 Portrait (240mm f/4). These are the optics that give me the look and feel that I want. Painterly, and poetic. Like a half remembered dream. A memory. And they are of the time period I’m referring to in the work.

Sunflower

Sometimes, the details of the work are missed overlooked by the viewer. I’ve always enjoyed reading about or watching documentaries about artists and their work; the “behind the scenes” stuff. It adds so much to the work. If you can get to know the person a little bit, and understand their perspective, it changes the work, empowers it, and really allows the narrative to shine. That’s why I encourage people to write about their work, think about their work, the fine subtle details of the content, or the technical approach that adds to the story. It makes it so much richer and deeper.

I used wet collodion today to create these images. I made negatives of sunflowers in my studio. They are in full force now. They are gorgeous peering east in the morning toward Tava and the sun. The wet collodion process is not sensitive to the color yellow or red. Photographing yellow flowers is difficult. I found a strategy today that worked. I really like these images as a diptych. The “black sunflower” and the “metallic sunflower”. They both can act as metaphors for this project. It was a good day.

These are Whole Plate, Palladium toned, Kallitype prints from wet collodion negatives. The color is exactly what I wanted for this work. I’m happy to be dialing that in through this process.

Symbols and Native American Beliefs

DEER ANTLERS
Deer bones and antlers were made into a variety of tools, weapons, and ceremonial items. The top part of the skull was made into spoons, while leg bones were formed into knife handles. Bone slivers were made into fine sewing needles and awls. Archaeologists have found deer antlers sheathed in copper, which may have been worn ceremoniously by tribal shamans. The antlers were also made into buttons, beads, and carved sculptures.

A Whole Plate toned Kallitype from a wet collodion negative. I used Platinum Palladium + gold toner and Sodium Citrate as the developer. This image is represented by the number 3 as well as showing the parts of the antlers used for buttons.

NUMBERS
Three represents the vertical picture of the world. Man lives in a space defined by the Heavens (the Upper World), the Earth (the Middle World), and the Underworld (the Lower World). The most significant numbers for the indigenous population of North America are three, four, and seven, and they play an important role in the lives of American Indians: in their mythology, rituals, and ceremonies, chants, literature, architecture, and visual arts, households, etc.

SYMBOLS & PHILOSOPHIES
I’m very interested in Native American symbols. I’m interested in how indigenous people view/viewed the world through these symbols and what we can learn from them. The animals, objects, numbers, weather, planets, and patterns. These cultures are rich with meaning and connection. They live/lived their lives in a completely different way from the average American today. In my opinion, it’s a more connected and more beautiful way to live. It’s full of meaning and purpose.

I was out yesterday making photographs of huge rock outcroppings in Red Rock Canyon. The Ute/Tabeguache called them, “the bones of Mother Earth”. It’s where the Ute origin story begins. I was thinking about how disconnected the average American has become from nature. They live in a synthetic world, physically and mentally. They’re geared toward consumption and greed. They feel entitled to ravage and destroy anything and everything if it means they get more. More money or more fame. Money seems to be the biggest driver in their lives. To me, they’ve lost the most important concepts in life; respect, selflessness, gratitude, humility, admiration, empathy, compassion, and the ability to really love. These attributes seem rare in our (American) culture today. However, it’s understandable given our “education” and the “values” we’ve been taught. The drive for money and fame is out in the open. It’s celebrated. People flaunt their desire for both, at any cost. To me, it’s such an empty, and meaningless life to live that way. Conspicuous consumption, the drive for fame and wealth; nothing else. It feels like the American motto now.

PHOTOGRAPHS I WANT TO MAKE
I gathered these antlers from I’m going to try and explore some of the symbols of the indigenous people that lived here. Some images will be more conceptual than literal. This is the kind of work I like making. It’s meaningful and powerful to me. I get to learn new things, contemplate new ideas, and sometimes, even implement new philosophies into my life. What more can you ask for? Making art is a great teacher. It allows time for new world views to soak in and take hold. It can enlighten and inform both the viewer and the maker. I like that is the definition of Art.

The Medicine Wheel Printed as a Toned Kallitype

I love so many of these old printing processes I couldn’t help but print “The Medicine Wheel” negative as a (toned) Kallitype print.

What is a Kallitype? Patented in 1889 by W. W. J. Nicol (1855-1929), the Kallitype print is an iron-silver process. These are generally referred to as "Siderotype" processes. A chemical process based on the use of a combination of ferric and silver salts. The Kallitype uses ferric oxalate and silver nitrate as the sensitizer. The use of ferric oxalate allows for both extended shadow definition (higher DMAX) and contrast control.

Many developing solutions can be used to give a different image color (brown, sepia, blue, maroon, and black). I like the more “red” colors. I used sodium citrate as a developer on this print.

These prints were popular in the 19th century, and then their popularity faded away. Sometimes known as "the poor man's platinum print", when the image is toned in platinum or palladium the result is nearly chemically identical to a true Platinotype or Palladiotype or a combination. It is believed that many Kallitypes were passed off as true Platinotypes and remain in collections as so. Kallitypes have had a reputation over the years as having poor archival qualities and often fading. When properly cleared, Kallitypes are completely archivable and will not fade. Toning with a metal such as gold, platinum, or palladium (like this print was) will give extra image permanence. Ferrous ions embedded in the paper as a result of poor clearing can cause a short life (image permanence) for the print. This can be easily identified by a yellow stain in the highlights.

The wet collodion negative of “The Medicine Wheel”. I use a combination of Sutton’s formulas and my own take on the wet collodion negative making process.

The Medicine Wheel

A few days ago, while I was working on my statement, a piece of information kept coming back to me after reading it and writing about it. It was about the medicine wheel.

The Tabeguache/Ute put one in the center of every new camp, connecting them to Mother Earth. For some reason, I couldn’t get this out of my head. I was trying to visualize it. Was it big? Was it small? What was it made of? I had gathered a lot of white quartz rock on our walks and decided to lay them out on a Ponderosa Pine stump. I wasn’t sure it was going to work. It didn’t look that impressive in real life. Collodion negatives and prints have a way of transforming things and telling their own story.

I really love this print. I’m sure it will be in the final selection of the work. The white quartz is bright and illuminated and the swirl from the old lens gives the image motion - like it’s alive. I really do love it.

Something Different

I wanted to try something different today. I ran out of time printing this - I’ll add to this post tomorrow after I nail the print. I’m at 6 minutes with this one. I’ll run a test of 7, 8, and 9 minutes tomorrow and find the sweet spot.

There is something I like about this a lot. I know it’s underexposed, but there is a quality about it - its contrast and brightness appeal to me. I used an old Derogy f/4 and the movement or “swirl” is very attractive to me - it sets the wheel in motion. There is so much UV up here, this was a 1.5-second exposure and it is very dense. I would say 2+ DMax. I didn’t check it, but I bet I’m close.

Artist's Statement

In The Shadow of Sun Mountain (Tava Kaavi)

“The key to the creative type is that he is separated out of the common pool of shared meanings. There is something in his life experience that makes him take in the world as a problem; as a result, he has to make personal sense out of it.”

― Ernest Becker, from the Denial of Death

Most Americans live their day-to-day lives without ever thinking about the history of their country. Words like genocide, land dispossession, forced migration, and colonization are rarely in the minds of average Americans. It’s the opposite for me. I think about these things almost every day. 

I live in the Rocky Mountains of Colorado. It’s beautiful here. The landscape is breathtaking. It’s the closest thing to a perfect place I’ve ever been. However, it has a very sordid and sad history. 

With this work, I want to share both the beauty and the tragedy of this place I call home. Through these photographs, I want to esteem the Ute people both past and present. I hope to engage the viewer long enough to put this history and the people into their consciousness.

I’ve approached this work from a place of deference, wonder, sadness, and loss. I’m torn about where I live and what I know. I often think about what happened here and question why it did. It confuses me and creates inner conflict for me; like a type of cognitive dissonance. I struggle with living on this land, and yet I’m in awe every day of how sublime and beautiful it is.

What do I do with this terrible history? My answer is to embrace it, study it, wrestle with it and transform it into a weapon for the human spirit; one that will enlarge my sense of responsibility and strengthen my moral resolve.

This project has also served as a cathartic release for me. That’s why the work was made. While the work is metaphorical, it acts as a catalyst in resolving my relationship with the land, its history, and the people that lived here.

At dawn, Tava-Kaavi (Sun Mountain) is the first Colorado mountain to catch the sun’s rays. The mountain is over 14,000 (4.300m) feet above sea level. The Ute believes it’s where Mother Earth meets Father Sky.

Before it was America’s Mountain, “Pikes Peak” (its colonized name), it stood at the center of the Tabeguache (tab-a-watch) band of the Nuche/Ute tribe’s geography and identity. They were the “People of the Sun Mountain,” placed there by Sunif (the wolf) to grow and flourish amid the foothills of the majestic peak.

The Tabeguache tribe was the largest of the ten nomadic bands of the Ute. They followed the herds of wild animals throughout their lands, harvesting the elk, deer, and buffalo at specific places at certain times of the year. This lifestyle mandated that they move their camp every three or four weeks. They constructed a medicine wheel at the heart of each new camp, linking them to Mother Earth like an umbilical cord. The big rock outcroppings were called, “the bones of Mother Earth”. And the huge red rock formations were considered “grandfathers.”

I live in one of the areas where the Tabeguache tribe lived during the summer months. My photographs are about honoring the people, the plants they used, the rocks, and the trees they dwelt among and used to survive and thrive for many centuries.

The work is made with the 19th-century wet and dry collodion photographic processes in the Whole Plate format (6.5” x 8.5”). I used a period lens circa 1870 for the work. From the glass negatives, I’ve made prints that are Palladium Platinum prints, Rawlins Oil prints, and Kallitype prints. All contact printing processes from the late 19th century and the early 20th century. It was very important for me to use period processes and period gear for these images. The processes and optics have a way of transporting the viewer to that time period (1850 - 1900). 

I called this body of work, “In the Shadow of Sun Mountain” because the photographs are all made with the great mountain watching over. It's constant and nothing escapes its presence. The Ute honored and respected this land and all of the life on it, never taking more than they needed. The fauna, flora, and landscape represent all that they loved. It provided the shelter, food, and medicine they survived on. Their life here was balanced and good.

Ben Mitchell, guest curator of "Edward S. Curtis: The North American Indian" said "...history is a very powerful force, because history, when you’re immersed in it, isn’t just looking at the past, history constantly informs the present you’re living in — or it better, if we’re paying attention...history also points us to our future that we’re going to share. We learn from history how to live in our present, and how to plan to live in our future.”

I can’t change the past. No one can. But my hope is that the viewers of this work will remember these terrible events in history and wrestle with them. I want to put a “pebble in their shoe” and have them think about the past, the present, and the future. I hope to inspire, motivate and create compassion and empathy for the people and the land.