Methodology Review : Using the Materiality of Graffiti and Setting the Cyanotype Free

I decided on my next journey to Bristol, I would make 2 changes to my methodology. This part of Innovate was effectively the second part of the project for me. It had become distilled into :

Marrying a ‘linguistic landscape’ with the people passing through it.

I was trying to conflate at least 2 identities.

The two changes I considered were :

Firstly I decided to complement the Cyanotype images with portraits which used the actual graffiti and materiality of the Roundabout as a backdrop.

Secondly, i considered the Cyanotype cloth in the first portraits to be inert, clumsy and as portrayed between 2 sticks in the ground, stolid. Symbolism should not be rooted to the earth, should not be grounded; as a metaphor it I consider it should be light, free floating and air-bound.

I recalled the true meaning of the Spanish worde duende which described the process of flamenco as understood by the gitano population in Spain. Gypsies considered the term ‘duende‘ referred to the meta-physical process of drawing energy from substance and expelling the same energy as spirit through the medium of dance. ‘From Earth to Air’ seems a good analogy for a Cyanotype cloth to describe transition from the material to the symbolic.

I went to Bristol on both 25th March and 28th March, both bright, cold and windy days.

I attached the Cyanotype cloth to a string had I fastened between lamp-posts at the centre of the Underpasses and tried to photograph between the gusts. It was impossible; the cloth was never still.

I feel it is always important for photographers to be aware of similar, overlapping creative processes even if those experiences occur at different times and places. Photographing the Cyanotype cloth in such a strong wind reminded me intrusively of photographing a flapping piece of fence in west Africa in 2025.

I decided to delay using the Cyanotype cloth hanging from string until a calmer day, I decided to make my first portraits using different parts of the local materiality, choosing several underpasses and lamp-posts rich in graffiti. I repeated the same process on the 28th March.