Introducing
Ink Studies
Ink Studies is an ongoing exploration of colour derived from plants, bark, roots, leaves, flowers, and seasonal organic material. Each ink is extracted and processed by hand, resulting in colours that shift with time, harvest conditions, oxidation, concentration, and exposure to light. Rather than resisting this instability, the work embraces it. These pieces function as both artwork and material record; observations of plant behaviour, impermanence, and transformation.
Harvesting Fireweed
Much of the work begins long before ink reaches paper. Plants are gathered slowly and intentionally, often close to home and in rhythm with the season they emerge from. Harvesting is approached as both material collection and relational practice; paying attention to abundance, timing, reciprocity, and the conditions surrounding the plant itself. Fireweed, one of the first plants explored in this series, carries not only colour, but memory of place, weather, landscape, and time.
SEASONAL NOTES
The work before the work
A small jar of ink holds far more time than it appears to. Before colour ever reaches paper, there is the slow work of finding the plant, waiting for the right season, harvesting carefully, extracting pigment, reducing liquid, straining, testing, and observing how the material behaves over days and weeks. Even the byproducts of the process become unexpectedly beautiful. Paper towels stained during extraction and tool cleaning often carry layered traces of colour, sediment, and plant matter that feel as compelling as the finished ink itself. The process continually blurs the line between preparation, experimentation, and artwork.