Feeding Signs is a series of photographs that celebrates the long-evolved relationships between plants and insects and asks us to reframe the negative perceptions many of us in Western culture have about them. Over hundreds of millions of years, co-evolution of plants and insects through feeding, pollination or nesting, has driven the myriad complex morphological and behavioural features that we see today. So strong are the bonds that have formed, that many have become symbiotic; some plants relying on a specific group of insects to pollinate them and, conversely, some insect species becoming so highly specialised to a particular plant that their very survival depends on its presence in a habitat. The evidence of this is inscribed in every nibble, chew mark and hole in the leaves in our landscapes, as seen in the images in the project.
Our collective ability to appreciate these relationships is, however, impaired by our distorted aesthetic and negative language, as herbivorous insects and wildflowers alike are generally regarded as unsightly pests and weeds. Evidence of browsing and grazing by wild and livestock mammals is known as ‘feeding signs’, but with insects it is referred to as ‘damage’.
To counter this, I present insects and plants as active participants in my work – regarding them as ‘co-makers’, rather than objects. My intention is to reconnect us with the foundations of our natural topography. For example, by illustrating the common nettle not as a weed, but as the primary food source for one of our most beloved butterflies – the Peacock – we can reframe how we feel about species we have been nurtured to dislike.
Using a lower-toxicity method of cyanotype photography, this work in progress illustrates the plant-insect relationships that have shaped the landscapes in which we live; their ecologies written in the abundance and diversity of flowers that form our past and present. The work embeds plants within the image-making process, acknowledging the role that our native wild plants play in a healthy ecosystem, looking toward a future photography based on a deeper reciprocity with nature. It positions us as a species within a shared ecosystem, asking us to reflect on the threads of connectedness that have shaped our world.
The first component of the project presents simple cyanotype compositions of leaves that have, from my perspective, been enhanced, not damaged by the insects that have fed on them. In these photographs the insects are not merely subject, they are participant and collaborator, indexically controlling the visual narrative. The cyanotypes are bleached using a weak washing soda solution, then toned with liquid made from extractions of the same plant, rendering them in soft hues of browns that are all slightly different and highlight the unique biologies within individual species.
In the second component I examine the symbiotic associations that insects have with plant species, by weaving my own archive material into cyanotype compositions, that I call ‘digicyanotypes’. The plant photogram elements of these compositions are unique, but insects are digital reproductions; ghosts of subjects past and revealing another layer of symbiosis – that of the positive and negative nature of photography. These reconstructions reimagine the works of Anna Atkins and Maria Sibylla Merian; speculating on how their own work may have developed, had they had access to technological advances in photography.
Zine created to accompany the project.