FeNaClSi sans H₂O — Howard Leu

Ferric Salt Print Experiment (FeNaClSi-H₂O)

gallery

Cyanotype and gelatin on glass
4”x6” each
2024

These four pieces were created during my 2024 artist residency with Artservancy. During the residency, I spent time observing the relationship between ecology and human activities on the Milwaukee River East Bank (roughly between Locust Street on the north to Caesar Park just south of North Avenue). I explored the urban waterway and how the built environment shapes the chemical makeup of our rivers and streams.

Natural ecology is adaptive to a certain degree, and man-made elements are forever embedded in these waterways and soil. Nothing is completely natural. As I ruminated on this, I began to imagine the makeup in the water and what is in it. Milwaukee residents are cautioned not to drink or bathe in the water because of heavy pollutants from industries for over a century. I thought about giving form to the invisible—traces of minerals and chemicals in the water—using elements found in cyanotype: ferric compounds, salt, light, and water. Gelatin acts as a binder, anchoring these materials to glass panes, then let the reactions create forms, tones, and patterns.

Ironically, water evaporates in the process but like when we look onto the river, we see only water and often not the content within it. The color blue in the work hint at diminsionality, as blue in water, the sky, flowers, or animals aren’t from pigments that can be called blue alone. The blue we see are from several elements that come into play. That makes blue as mysterious as our waterways, as we see what we want to see in our consciousness.