"chemical bath" artists: Charles Guerin

Evening everyone,

tonight we are writing about Charles Guerin, a French photographer who uses a wide range of traditional and alternative printing techniques. Charles works exclusively with analogue photographs, and also develops and prints them himself. His work covers wet and dry plate collodion, cyanotypes, gumoil, gum dichromate, van dyke and others; he also takes polaroids. 

The main themes in Charles's photography are nature and portraiture. His landscapes are very classical and have a composition reminiscent of Victorian postcards; his portraits often capture his subjects in half-movement, using techniques that require layering emulsions, which add extra tones, giving them a three-dimensional texture and quality. Charles's still lifes present the subjects from a close up, with a uniform background, which emphasizes the details without distracting the viewer's gaze.

You can find more of Charles's images on his flickr and facebook page, where you can also see various stages of print production and an in-depth analysis and info about the techniques he uses to create them.