The Lost and Found

"The Lost and Found" is a response to the decline of the area and the city in which I live. I collect rubbish from the street in an attempt to not only turn it into something useful but something beautiful. The area in which I run my studio has a collection of creative businesses; tattooists, art galleries, recording studios, all working together as a creative community. I wanted to photograph the people that are involved in that creative community using objects found in their locality. I have always been obsessed by process, how something works, why something works? I enjoy playing with different photographic materials and techniques until I suddenly find myself working on a more specific project. These portraits were created using plastic bottles found on the street outside my studio. The bottles are flattened, "sensitised" and then loaded into a 5x4 sheet film camera to be used much like conventional photographic negatives. These "negatives" are then developed and Silver gelatine prints are produced by hand using traditional darkroom techniques.