Delesseria sinuosa, var.
1843-1853
Anna Atkins created this stunning image in the 1840s, making her one of the very first people to publish a book illustrated entirely with photographs. She used a technique called cyanotype, placing seaweed directly onto light-sensitive paper and exposing it to sunlight to create this ghostly, intricate white silhouette against a deep Prussian blue background. It looks like a delicate underwater snowflake, but it's actually a scientific record of a specific type of algae. Atkins' work beautifully blurred the line between art and science, creating 'photograms' long before the term was even coined.
- Technique
- Cyanotype
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