All images © Rosalind Hobley, shared with permission

In London-based artist Rosalind Hobley’s expressive cyanotypes, flowers assume a portrait-like quality through varied textures and supple shapes. In her Still Life series, a cast of dahlias, anemones, roses, and peonies sit like regal subjects. Originally trained in figurative sculpture, she uses light and shade to accentuate form and gesture. “I aim for my prints to have the weight and presence of a piece of sculpture,” she tells Colossal.

Cyanotype is an early form of photography, first invented in 1842, named for the monochromatic rich blue hue of its prints. Hobley uses cotton rag paper with a light sensitive solution of iron salts and then leaves it to dry in the dark. She then exposes it to UV light under large format negatives, and finishes up by washing the prints in water, where they develop their characteristic blue color. “I love the mess and creativity of the cyanotype process,” she says. “I am interested in techniques which translate the photographic image into something more interesting and exciting. I like mistakes, blur, brushstrokes, loss of definition, spontaneity.”

Hobley has work in the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition, which runs June 21-August 21, 2022. She also has prints of available for sale on her website, and you can find more on Instagram.

• Robotic Strawberry Picker Plucks More Berries Than 6 Human Workers
• What Happens When a Doctor Makes a Mistake