Chemigrams were invented in 1956 by Pierre Cordier, and is where you pain different substances on to light sensitive paper and then putting it into the different developer and fixer chemicals. The outcome is an image with different shapes and outlines left by the substances. Each substance will let through a different amount of light onto the paper, resulting in various outcomes.
Pierre Cordier
On Novemeber 10th 1956, Cordier was creating a birthday card for a girl named Erika. He painted nail varnish onto photographic paper and expermineted with a process, which later became known as a chemigram. He saw it as a way of combining photography and painting, and allowed him to "create entrancing images impossible to realize by any other means". Cordier said his work "combined the physics of painting (varnish, oil, wax) and the chemistry of photography (photosensitive emulsion, developer, and fixer), without the use of a camera or enlarger, and in full light". Cordier continued to experiment with Chemigrams and create the well-known technique, as well as creating photographic self-portraits.
Below are some of Cordiers work;
My Chemigrams
During class, we experimented with making our own chemigrams and how the different substances affected it. Here are the chemigrams I created;
I think my outcomes went well for the first try. I experimented with the different substances and how they reacted with each other and the paper. I think my best one was the thirs image, where i used honey. The honey was very thick and therefore didn't let much light through, helping to create distinctive lines. In my second image, I used washing up liquid, water and a sponge. I made bubbles on the image, however I feel I rushed this one and next time I will try to make the bubbles more structures and, because there were a few areas where there were larger amounts of washing up liquid, it meant that where the bubbles were isn't as distinctive as I would like. In the first image, I used nail varnish, and this is what left the yellow parts on the paper. I like this as none of my other images had colour left behind, and the only colour that started to develop on them was from the exposure to light. Next time I will experiment with more substances together and see how they react. I will also take more time arranging the substances on the paper to create a more structured outccome.