“Fauxssilles” for the future: cyanotype expressions on plastic waste

Abstract

This thesis focuses on the increasing plastic waste problem in the marine environment and it tries to create an artistic reflection with the Cyanotype photographic technique in order to create a body of work that highlights the relationship between found Plastic Objects and Cyanotype Photographs. The project conceptualizes the plastics as the fossils of the future since the material is highly durable and much resistant than the organic components in the marine environment. The conceptualization of these “fauxssilles” sounds like fossils, focuses on the plastics and photographic series being “faux”; meaning “fake” and “false”. The Cyanotype as one of the earliest photographic techniques has been used for this series with a reference to the first photographic book by Anna Atkins, and this alternative photographic process has been selected as the Cyan - Prussian blue of Cyanotype technique has a reference to the marine environment and the chemistry (plasticity) of cyanotype prints are as durable as the content of the images of the plastics. The research focuses on the plastic waste problem and examines key artworks, in addition to the research on the theoretical framework in photography theory, focusing on permanence, memory and the evidence aspects of photography. The experimentation process uses photograms and the final implementation is a series of 14 photographs. The photographed objects were selected according to the Ocean Conservancy 2017 report, following the top 10 found item on ocean shores.