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Jo Atherton

Artist working with found objects gathered on the UK coastline

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  • Cyanotypes
  • Printing
  • Flotsam Weaving
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    • Museum of the Future
    • University College London Sustainability Awards
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Contact

The quickest and easiest way to contact me is by email – joanna.atherton@gmail.com or phone 07879016701.

I regularly post about my practice, works in progress and inspirations on Twitter via @JoAtherton and @FlotsamWeaving. Follow @Fifty_Things to journey through my collection as I write about fifty key finds, exploring our material culture.

You can also find me on Instagram – @joannaatherton

 

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Instagram Gallery

#Harrold Country Park, #Bedfordshire #harroldcountrypark
Experimenting with positive and negative images of the same #flotsam #cyanotype design, capitalising on the October sunshine. Hope to have something for you very soon @paperonwall! Every object used to create these #patterns I've collected on UK beaches during almost a decade of #beachcombing.
Tinkering with #repeatpatterns today, based on the #cyanotype #photogram designs I created during my #BrisonsVeor residency back in July. These intricate images were created using plastic #foundobjects collected on our coastline which were placed on light sensitive paper to create a ghostly outline. After some technical wizardry, the designs are repeated, transformed into intriguing patterns which demand a closer look. On closer inspection, common, everyday items emerge from what was assumed to be no more than an aesthetic pattern. Does our #materialculture reveal any memories or stories from your life? #surfacedesign #wallpaperdesign #wallpaper #interiordesign #patterndesign #oceanplastic #anthropocene #anthropoceneart #oceanplastic #tideline #strandline #lostandfound #materialculture
Tinkering with #repeatpatterns today, based on the #cyanotype #photogram designs I created during my #BrisonsVeor residency back in July. These intricate images were created using plastic #foundobjects collected on our coastline which were placed on light sensitive paper to create a ghostly outline. After some technical wizardry, the designs are repeated, transformed into intriguing patterns which demand a closer look. On closer inspection, common, everyday items emerge from what was assumed to be no more than an aesthetic pattern. Does our #materialculture reveal any memories or stories from your life? #surfacedesign #wallpaperdesign #wallpaper #interiordesign #patterndesign #oceanplastic #anthropocene #anthropoceneart #oceanplastic #tideline #strandline #lostandfound #materialculture
Tinkering with #repeatpatterns today, based on the #cyanotype #photogram designs I created during my #BrisonsVeor residency back in July. These intricate images were created using plastic #foundobjects collected on our coastline which were placed on light sensitive paper to create a ghostly outline. After some technical wizardry, the designs are repeated, transformed into intriguing patterns which demand a closer look. On closer inspection, common, everyday items emerge from what was assumed to be no more than an aesthetic pattern. Does our #materialculture reveal any memories or stories from your life? #surfacedesign #wallpaperdesign #wallpaper #interiordesign #patterndesign #oceanplastic #anthropocene #anthropoceneart #oceanplastic #tideline #strandline #lostandfound #materialculture
We enjoyed a delicious lunch today at the idyllic Trout Inn near Oxford to celebrate our third wedding anniversary. #InspectorMorse fans may recognise this as one of his favourite watering holes. Afterwards, a lazy stroll along the river was in order and I can recommend #toesintheThames as a perfect antidote to this week's baking summer heat.
These #plastiglomerate pebbles have been created by resting plastic #foundobjects from the #tideline on light sensitive cyanotype paper. #Plastiglomerate is formed when plastic melts and fuses with natural materials such lava fragments, sand, shells, wood and coral, resulting in a plastic-rock hybrid. It is thought to be a permanent marker of the #anthropocene in the geological record. There is a trend for stone balancing in #Cornwall, a common sight on the beaches I visited during my #BrisonsVeor #artistresidency. These miniature stone installations make for great Instagram photos but have been met with resistance as numbers of pebble stacks reach epic proportions, damaging wildlife habitats for the sake of a photo. My collaged cyanotype stone stacks address our relationship with the natural world, in the case of our deep time impact and the use of the environment for the fleeting immediacy of an Instagram photo. #FutureFossils #plastiglomerate #anthropocene #fossilrecord #deeptime #brisonsveor #surfacedesign #pattern #cyanotype #sunprint #blueprint #tideline #singleuse #oceanplastic #flotsam #pebbles #stones #petrocultures #discardstudies #artistresidency #cyanotype #BrisonsVeor #collage #pebblestack #stonestack #stonestacking #plasticpebbles #Cornwall #stonestacking #stonebalancing #pebblebalancing #pebblestack #stonestack
And just like that, the #artistresidency was over. This was the final glimpse of my home for the past two weeks before starting the long drive back to Hartold. I return home with inspirations, aspirations and most of all, realisations of how landlocked my life is here in rural Bedfordshire! Thank you to the #BrisonsVeor Trust for granting me this opportunity to work on the very tip of England with the sea as my metronome for two weeks.
Working in #cyanotype, a primitive #photography technique first developed in the 1800s, Jo creates bold images and #patterns with a ghostly feel. Many of these everyday items found on our #coastlines will inevitably become material ghosts, speaking at a time when fossil fuels and plastics were so abundant in our daily lives. These bold images present an #uncanny reflection of ourselves, harnessing solar energy to produce haunting yet familiar remnants of our #materialculture. Indeed, the plastic objects themselves are remnants of ancient sunlight, via the oil used in their construction. The technique itself, which relies on the sun’s power to create these striking images on light sensitive paper references the sun's energy, upon which we all depend.
Working in #cyanotype, a primitive #photography technique first developed in the 1800s, Jo creates bold images and #patterns with a ghostly feel. Many of these everyday items found on our #coastlines will inevitably become material ghosts, speaking at a time when fossil fuels and plastics were so abundant in our daily lives. These bold images present an #uncanny reflection of ourselves, harnessing solar energy to produce haunting yet familiar remnants of our #materialculture. Indeed, the plastic objects themselves are remnants of ancient sunlight, via the oil used in their construction. The technique itself, which relies on the sun’s power to create these striking images on light sensitive paper references the sun's energy, upon which we all depend.
Working in #cyanotype, a primitive #photography technique first developed in the 1800s, Jo creates bold images and #patterns with a ghostly feel. Many of these everyday items found on our #coastlines will inevitably become material ghosts, speaking at a time when fossil fuels and plastics were so abundant in our daily lives. These bold images present an #uncanny reflection of ourselves, harnessing solar energy to produce haunting yet familiar remnants of our #materialculture. Indeed, the plastic objects themselves are remnants of ancient sunlight, via the oil used in their construction. The technique itself, which relies on the sun’s power to create these striking images on light sensitive paper references the sun's energy, upon which we all depend.
Working in #cyanotype, a primitive #photography technique first developed in the 1800s, Jo creates bold images and #patterns with a ghostly feel. Many of these everyday items found on our #coastlines will inevitably become material ghosts, speaking at a time when fossil fuels and plastics were so abundant in our daily lives. These bold images present an #uncanny reflection of ourselves, harnessing solar energy to produce haunting yet familiar remnants of our #materialculture. Indeed, the plastic objects themselves are remnants of ancient sunlight, via the oil used in their construction. The technique itself, which relies on the sun’s power to create these striking images on light sensitive paper references the sun's energy, upon which we all depend.
Working in #cyanotype, a primitive #photography technique first developed in the 1800s, Jo creates bold images and #patterns with a ghostly feel. Many of these everyday items found on our #coastlines will inevitably become material ghosts, speaking at a time when fossil fuels and plastics were so abundant in our daily lives. These bold images present an #uncanny reflection of ourselves, harnessing solar energy to produce haunting yet familiar remnants of our #materialculture. Indeed, the plastic objects themselves are remnants of ancient sunlight, via the oil used in their construction. The technique itself, which relies on the sun’s power to create these striking images on light sensitive paper references the sun's energy, upon which we all depend.
These images have been worked up from printing directly with plastic #foundobjects collected on the #tideline before being transferred to acetate to act as negatives in this early #photography technique. I'm particularly interested in two timescales in this body of work - the temporary nature of the tideline and the #singleuse objects I collect there, posited against the #deeptime origins of oil and the ancient #diatoms from which it is formed. Sunlight is the force that links these elements together, and is necessary in my process in the creation of these intricate images.
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