Photographs of Glass Refractions

My current art practice records the interaction of sunlight within vintage glass. While gazing at late afternoon daylight entering my studio I noticed how refractions animated its 19th century window panes creating an aurora-like visual drama. I began photographing this scattering and polarization of slanted daylight within the textured glass. As wavelength components of white light bend at different angles they converge at various focal points separating into colours and patterns. In this liminal zone of uncertainty light bounces around the translucent space transforming itself in a process of disintegration. Philosopher Merleau-Ponty would describe this phenomena as a rupture of normal perception enabling us to experience things more intensely by way of the senses rather than the intellect. The window pane thus becomes a transformative lens through which to contemplate this vital non-human world creating a meditative field within the photograph. 

ALL PHOTOGRAPHS COPYRIGHT BERNADETTE SMITH

Equinox

Burst

Vortex

detail Vortex 2

Rapture

Still

detail Still

Sun Strokes

Cloudscape

Remains of the Day

Afternoon Light

Diurnal Variations

Blue Shift

Through a Glass Darkly

Blue and Gold Lines

Last Light

Soiree

Last Rays



Meridian

detail from Meridian

Bernadette Smith is a Sydney based contemporary artist using photomedia and installation to explore the optical phenomenon of water and glass refractions. She is currently a Higher Degree by Research student at Sydney College of the Arts. Most recently her work was selected for Sunstudio Emerging Photographers Prize, Art on the Greenway, Newtown Art Seat, Beams Festival, Nocturnal Arts Festival, Electrofringe Festival, Harbour Sculpture Prize, Fishers Ghost Art Award and SCA Showcase at Verge Gallery, University of Sydney.