Blake Andrews
As a photographer, I have little imagination. Instead, I rely on the world to provide me content. It's never failed yet.
Sometimes that world includes mistakes. And if I'm paying attention, they can guide me down a new rabbit hole. This was the origin of Darkroom Pranks. During an otherwise routine day last year making work prints in the darkroom, I accidentally wiped some fixer on a piece of RC paper before exposing it. The fixed areas came up blank inside the image, of course. Not too surprising, but what intrigued me was the way the fixed areas interacted with the surrounding photo. That particular image had a big puff of smoke abutting the fixer. The blend between the two created a serendipitous void. It was an accident, and also seemingly ordained, in the way that sometimes happens in good photos.
One thing led to another. Over the next few months, I tinkered with various liquids and objects in the darkroom, placing them atop the paper during normal 35 mm exposures. The results weren't always worthwhile but they were consistently thought provoking. Most importantly they generally surprised me. I could never tell how one might turn out, and indeed each print in the series proved to be unique.
There are 24 images in the series. The submission for Blue Sky Drawers represents a selection of ten favorites. The ones I like best tend to feature interaction between photogram and exposure in a way that is ambiguous. For those who expect photographs to represent a direct translation of the world, they might come across as pranks.