Edd Carr’s animations use plant-powered processes to explore our ecological crisis

As co-leader of photo research organisation Sustainable Darkrooms, Yorkshire-born artist Edd Carr takes a very hands-on approach when it comes to his moving image projects. Pushing the limits of alternative photographic processes such as cyanotypes by translating them, frame by frame, into animation, his work has always been “highly material-led”, he tells us.

Nature itself is heavily involved in the artist’s process. As part of his practice Edd has built a “darkroom garden” in which he “grows plants to be used as sustainable alternatives to traditional processes”, for his tactile filmmaking. He is often “developing film in plants [...] or burying it in the sea”, he says, using organic materials to create emulsions for printmaking. He has also, somehow, made good use of his garden’s soil for his filmmaking pursuits in his project Yorkshire Dirt: a film entirely printed on ground soil, using low-tech processes Edd’s created himself. The project is currently on display at the Saatchi Gallery in London, and has received an innovation award at the EFEA festival.

Edd tells us his work is centred around exploring “our relationship to ecological crisis and the sixth mass extinction”, his alternative methods closely linking to the themes running through his animations. The artist draws from his own experiences living with chronic PTSD “to explore similar experiences within the context of climate and ecological crisis”, he says. His particular interest lies in drawing parallels between familiar human experiences and collective, non-human experiences of climate change, as shown in his recent work Lepidoptera: a film that interweaves narratives of childhood trauma and insect extinction, spanning nearly 3000 hand-printed frames.

Making a name for himself with his textural cyanotype animations that make you feel like you are watching underwater, Edd has done a number of commissions using his analogue processes for the likes of Adidas, Vivienne Westwood and more. Recently commissioned by Tyrone LeBon, “a big influence video-wise” for Edd, he has worked on a Sustainable Darkrooms documentary, alongside the project’s collaborators Hannah Fletcher and Alice Cazenave. The film is titled: I am a darkroom, and investigates eco-conscious photographic processes, interviewing residents of The Sustainable Darkroom and discussing their alternative practices.