2027 SPE Annual Conference: Community in Contrast
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print this pagePulse: Tracing Nature Through Lumen Printing
Rachel Reisert
Saturday, October 17 - 1:00PM to 1:30PM
Hopkins 246
Pulse is a collection of images created through the camera-less process of lumen printing. To make each image, I place plant matter on light-sensitive photographic paper and use sunlight for the exposure. The resulting impressions are shaped by opacity, time, heat, and the biological makeup of the materials, making each print both intentional and unpredictable. The process connects my practice to photography's earliest experiments, when paper, botanicals, and sunlight were among the first image-making tools. The sun functions as both a literal and symbolic force. It creates each image while serving as the essential source of life, nourishing growth in all living things. There is a glow and magical quality to the unfixed lumen print that is lost when treated in traditional photographic chemistry. To capture and contain the image, I scan the paper before the image fades. The original print surrenders to the light of the scanner, but its record remains.
The project also incorporates vintage and early anatomical drawings. I work with historical illustrations by selecting, cutting, repositioning, and retracing the lines made before the camera could document the human form. These drawings reflect centuries of artistic skill and scientific observation. I acknowledge the vision of past artists and scientists, allowing their insight to resonate within my own practice while creating a dialogue between the human body and the natural world.
Pulse references the life-sustaining rhythm of the heart and examines our relationship with the earth and our temporal bodies. Humanity often forgets that we are nature. Our destruction of the environment is ultimately the destruction of ourselves. These images are rooted in a deep sense of environmental anxiety through the awareness that we are living through a period of accelerating ecological loss and uncertainty. They express urgency in recognizing the consequences of our actions and a longing for a renewed relationship with the natural world that sustains us. Through beauty and wonder, the work invites viewers to consider our shared vulnerability and connection. At the same time, the work suggests that our fragile, imperfect bodies might still serve as vessels for change.
Pulse relates directly to the conference theme of Momentum by exploring the continuous cycles of life and transformation. The lumen printing process itself depends upon movement through the passage of sunlight, the effects of time, and the ongoing biological changes within organic materials. By combining botanical forms with historical anatomical illustrations, the work highlights connections across generations, linking early photographic experimentation and scientific observation to contemporary concerns about our relationship with the environment. The pulse of the heart becomes a metaphor for the rhythms that connect all living things, reminding us that our actions set ecological change into motion, and we are responsible for how we carry forward.
This presentation will offer attendees an opportunity to learn about the historical foundations and contemporary possibilities of lumen printing while considering how alternative photographic processes can address urgent environmental and philosophical questions. By sharing the evolution of Pulse, from its earliest experiments to its current form, I hope to encourage dialogue about material-based image making, the role of photographic history in contemporary practice, and the potential for photography to deepen our understanding of our connection to the natural world.
speaker
Rachel Reisert
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