Jo Bradford
IMMERSIVE, 2021
IMMERSIVE, 2021 by ©Jo Bradford
|
|
From the early days of photography, capturing and representing light has been a constant pursuit for artists working with the medium. Previously the much studied domain of painting, the advent of colour photography with its accompanying technological advancements in multichromatic photosensitive papers and chemicals, equipped photographers with the tools that allowed them to break away from the constraints of painting’s expressive representation and to take steps towards capturing the properties of light that the human eye was unable to reveal unaided.
In this pursuit, cameraless photography techniques such as photograms and luminograms, emerged as particularly effective, often bridging the gap between the immediacy of the camera and the laborious and multi-layered construction of the canvas. It is this same pursuit to capture the essence of light that we find featuring so prominently in Jo Bradford’s work. A self-confessed colourist at heart, Bradford’s captivating pieces are the result of a choreography that happens in complete darkness, capturing flashes of light lasting only milliseconds directly onto photographic paper. A combination of hand movements and coloured filters produce unique flashes of colour. Through this performative sequence, which Bradford calls a dance, she is quite literally painting with light. |
IMMERSIVE, 2021 by ©Jo Bradford
IMMERSIVE, 2021 by ©Jo Bradford
|
This dance, however, is not a solo act. In her pursuit of capturing perfectly smooth light gradients on her prints, Bradford needed to address the limitations of human movement. As the exposure time was only fractions of a second, the slightest out of tune hand movement of the filters would result in broken gradients and stark vertical lines on the prints. To overcome this, she designed and built a robot assistant in 2016, that would move the filters in a way that allowed for the perfect visual outcome.
For her IMMERSIVE series produced in 2021, Bradford works with her latest dance partner, Robot number 6. Together, they work in complete darkness in the studio, capturing perfectly executed flashes of light in a series of unique images, directly onto photosensitive paper. The results of the dance are visible a few minutes later, when the print is fully exposed and the flash of light has been transformed into a single colourful fragment of something that would have been impossible for a human to experience unaided. |
IMMERSIVE, 2021 by ©Jo Bradford
|
What Bradford achieves, through this innovative approach towards producing photographic works, is to elevate the relationship between the photographer and the equipment into one where the technology is given true agency. When the image is actually captured, and even to a degree the forms or colours produced, are no longer solely under the photographer’s control. The robot has the capacity to act on an equal level with the human as a true collaborator in the creative process. The fact that the results are also so visually stunning, adds another dimension to the depth of this truly engaging body of work.
|
IMMERSIVE, 2021 by ©Jo Bradford
Bio
Jo makes work with experimental cameraless photographic mediums such as luminograms, photograms and cliché verre prints in her colour darkroom at Green Island Studios, her bespoke studio and workspace based on Dartmoor in the UK. Born in Hertfordshire, Jo was raised in Southern Africa, returning to the UK in her teens to finish school in Wales. She received her Masters Degree (Distinction) in Photography: Critical Practice from University College Falmouth in 2004. Her cameraless work is exhibited and sold internationally and has even been sent into space.
www.jobradford.com
www.jobradford.com