The Sustainable Photography Garden is in full bloom
There has been much excitement in the Sustainable Photographic Garden this year. So much that UCT CMD has made a short video about the garden and the teaching and research which takes place there, has just been released. We are so pleased to share this with you here and we hope this video can show your more of the exciting possibilities of the sustainable photographic garden for teaching, research. And of course for just relaxing in the garden.
The Sustainable Darkroom Garden is into its 3rd year (and 4th planting). In May 2023 the 2nd Year Earth PoliticsPhotography students planted the newest section, under the guidance of Vanessa Cowling, Associate Professor Svea Josephy and Nicole Fraser. We added first year clay heads that had been abandoned in the sculpture studios, in the interests of recycling these back into the earth, eventually. Nicholas Dowling helped us put up two wire and pole compost heaps. These have been filled with leaf litter from the garden, which is now composting and UCT Gardens donated some wood chip, compost and plants . The 2nd year students of 2023 planted spekboom for the 2nd year class of 2024. They also planted some new medicinal and flowering plants which we are hoping to experiment with in the sustainable photographic process.
In May we taught the Photography and Materiality Project during which Vanessa gave a workshop on anthotypes, lumen prints and phytograms using the sustainable photographic garden. We were also finally able to put up the water tank in June, for catching rain water. We harvested our very first orange and the spring flowers have also seen the return of the bees and butterflies where there were none 4 years ago.
Thank you to Associate Professor Fritha Langerman and the Khusela Ikamva project, to UCT Grounds and Gardens and to all the wonderful students, colleagues and friends who take part in this project.
