The process for each image in the show is slightly varying, though all of the photographs are unedited. James states: “I leave the editing to be done in front of the camera”. As a result the images undergo no post-production digital enhancement but instead rely upon the impeccable timing of the artist and the meticulous approach to staging the still-life compositions.

Upon entering the first room of the exhibition, one immediately feels the sublime effects of James’ magnificent images. Presented principally with Glass (2012), the beautifully expressive poignancy of James’ work is communicated instantly, inviting the viewer throughout the exhibition into carefully constructed realms of watery contemplation, vivid colour contrasts and captivating scientific methods which James so precisely creates.

James’ delicately ethereal rose and intense silky butterflies dominate the first room, radiating an absorbing luminosity. The lighting of the show echoes the nature and composition of James’ work with the images, the principal focal points, deliberately gleaming in the dusky exhibition space.

James tells the Positive: “The lighting is custom made specific to the job at hand, even the lighting for the show was custom made by me – over 60 light modules are installed at ‘Intersection’”, all contributing to the fascinating appearance of the photographic images.

The mesmerizingly intricate compositions of both living and dead organic materials exhibited in the images of the second room more noticeably reference the Vanitas paintings of 17th and 18th century Dutch Masters. The elements of James’ still life compositions range from cut flowers to luscious fruits, period ornaments to live butterflies, and are all delicately assembled beneath the surface of the water before being photographed.

While the initial theme and subject matter of the exhibition may appear perhaps to be sorrowful, upon a closer inspection the celebratory nature of the works is extremely potent.
James tells the Positive: “My work is directly influenced by my personal life experiences. It is very sad to think long on my driving forces; lost love. Something we can all connect with; but I use it in a very positive and celebratory way through my work.”

see the article and images at – http://thepositive.com/alexander-james-intersection/

The print is mounted to polished aluminum then museum grade anti-reflect acrylic is applied to the face using the Diasec process, adding greath depth to the feel of the piece. It is the framed by Mr Simon Quinn of Frame Junkie from a solid piece of aged walnut.

The next step is to produce in the format in which Andreas Gursky prepares his auction busting pieces by moving upto the 300cms and above mark, this will have me working closely with Grieger in Dusseldorf. Tickets booked; bring on the sauerkraut.

photo courtesy Simon Quinn Frame Junkie ©

“The reason this underwater aesthetic happened and the reason I’ve been doing this is that I’m trying to do something different, something original,” James tells us. “I knew that if you X-ray flowers, or if you hit them with UV light, you reveal this skeletal structure so I wanted to push that. Then comes the mad scientist bit – I knew in my mind’s eye what I wanted to create and so I had to experiment to work out how to achieve it.”

And experiment he did. Four months and a lot of roses later, James tells us that he has developed a three-stage process that takes five days. “‘There’s a chemical primer and there are two other primers based on temperature and water pressure,” he explains. “The chemical one is the catalyst that makes the process begin to happen and then there are five days of precise temperature control. it’s very important that the water is highly purified,” he adds, “otherwise it doesn’t work because you start to get bacteria or fungal infections and the plant starts to rot in just a few hours. So it’s this clinical, scientific environment that the specimen is left in – and it’s usually shot on day six.”

It‘s important, James maintains, to stress that the submerged flowers in these images aren’t dead or decaying, just as each South American butterfly he shot underwater for his Swarm series wasn’t dead but rather in a temperature-induced comatose state. “The amazing thing,” he tells us, “is that every night, as we drop the lighting, you see the submerged flower head pulling in and closing up, and in the morning, back in the light, they open up again, they’re completely alive and doing their thing.”

The flowers are alive but that’s not to say that James doesn’t carefully construct his square-format images. “We do fuck around [with the flowers] a lot, you can see in one of the images [see page 19] that we have pulled off a few petals, pulling away the layers to reveal the heart of the plant and a view of a rose that I absolutely know will have never been seen before.”

So what is it about shooting in water tanks that appeals to James? “The process [for the Glass images] is an underwater one but the aesthetic I’m interested in is about using the painterly effect of what the mechanics of water can do to the imagery,” he says. “I’m so bored of digital art in which everything’s been tampered with,” he continues. “What I’m doing, all happened as you see it here, there’s no post production or digital trickery. I’m fascinated by what goes on between object, lighting and lens, but also that bit where it shifts through the lens – that’s where the magic for me happens. The way I try to describe it is if you imagine you’re standing in the Mediterranean in three feet of water just looking at your toes dancing in the light – that’s my play area, that’s where I work.”

Editions of selected images from James’ ongoing Glass series are available in three different sizes: 60cm, l00cm, and 140cm. To see more from this series, visit DistilEnnul.com.