Seven alignments – files 1–72021
Artist statement: ‘Seven alignments – files 1–7’ is a single work made up of 14 found photographs. These have been mounted in pairs atop seven traditional filing cabinet hanging paper files, using an old photo-album mounting technique. The seven pairs of images are found and made to speak together. When you collect photographs in categories the rest of the world sneaks in. These pairings speak quietly, but they have plenty to say about photography and the world.
Each of these 14 photographs is either a discarded family snap or a remnant from a defunct newspaper archive. The world is awash with unhinged images. I have accumulated an archive of 50,000 of these photographs from which to find and make meaningful alignments amongst chance encounters.
Gelatin silver prints are black-and-white photographic prints that have been created using papers coated with an emulsion of gelatin and light-sensitive silver salts. After the papers are briefly exposed to light (usually through a negative), a chemical developer renders the latent image as reduced silver, which is then fixed and washed. This technique was first introduced in the 1870s and is still used today. Most twentieth-century black-and-white photographs are gelatin silver prints. They are known for being highly detailed and sharply defined prints with a distinguishable smooth, even image surface.
