As a child I captured ladybugs and took them home as ‘pets’ (and once released several dozen in our living room). I collected rocks and set leaf ‘boats’ adrift in streams. I marvelled at the tree giants among us, the shifting art made by clouds, and the stunning brushstrokes of the aurora borealis across the night sky. I have carried that love for nature into adulthood, and at 51 I am still that kid at heart.

Through cyanotypes and other techniques, I pay tribute to the natural world that I love so much. The cyanotype process was developed in 1842 by British scientist John Herschel and popularized by his friend Anna Atkins in her 1843 book Photographs of British Algae: Cyanotype Impressions. (Fun fact: this process was used to reproduce architectural drawings well into the 20th century — it’s why they’re called blueprints.)

The distinctive feature of a cyanotype is its shade of Prussian blue — created by combining two iron salts to make an iron-rich sensitizer solution that reacts with UV light — which can be toned with tannin-rich solutions to alter the colour palette. It’s like magic! But really, it’s science.