Lumen Prints

Lumen prints are a kind of photogram––a photographic image created without a camera––in which objects are placed on traditional photo paper and exposed in the sun for hours, or even days. The normal development process is skipped and the paper is placed directly into a fixer, revealing the colors and tones unique to the particular brand of paper. I became interested in this technique around 2015 and occasionally experiment with various flowers and foliage on some new batch of expired darkroom paper (which for some reason, seems to yield the most interesting results.) Additionally, all of the images here have been digitally manipulated or enhanced to highlight the most striking features and colors.