Nigredo
Constantin Schlachter
In ‘Nigredo’, Constantin Schlachter combines painting with his original practice, photography. In the privacy of his studio, he paints small formats (4x5 inches) in watercolor on paper. These images are then used as negatives and printed in the darkroom on chromogenic paper. In this process, the artist reverses the color values and densities of his paintings.
The printing process produces a positive from a negative, here darkness becomes light and vice versa. In the same way, red becomes cyan, green-magenta and yellow-blue. This technique also allowed him to create without the camera. From now on, the light would freeze the pigments of the paint directly onto the photographic paper, using a color enlarger.
The title of this series comes from alchemy. It refers to the first stage of the Great Work, also known as the ‘Work in Black’. For the alchemist, this involves confronting the Shadow within himself, by looking inwards. In this way, he gains access to his inner gold, his soul. Constantin Schlachter interprets this phase of the alchemical quest as a necessary letting go, through which he opens a window onto his spirit, to visit this inner landscape.
With their telluric and cosmic aspects, these prints invite the viewer into a meditative and contemplative state, where everyone is free to project their own inner world. This invitation is extended by a spontaneous hanging, in which the emotive images interact with each other according to the artist’s sensibility.
‘We all dream of travelling through the universe, but isn’t the universe within us?’ This was the question that Novalis used to sum up his definition of infinity in 1798.
Les Ombres de nos constellations
Les Ombres de nos constellations is a project that began in Paris in 2023. Using a 3D printer, he designed a film holder that is used as a petri dish. This object enables him to replace the photographic negative with a solution of agar on a glass plate, a ‘bio-negative’ that is single-use because it is cleansed after use. Over a period of ten days, the bacteria grown on this agar will multiply until they die.
This device enables him to make chromogenic prints of various micro-organisms. Without a camera, this technique directly prints the contours of an object by projection onto the photosensitive surface. The process lends itself perfectly to conveying the ephemerality and constant evolution of life. Each print is unique, revealing the poetry of a world invisible to the naked eye.
Constantin Schlachter’s approach is based on a reanimation of nature. He invites us to rethink our relationship with it, and to recognize its creativity, agentivity and intelligence. It was while photographing the landscape in his first book (La Trajectoire du Gyrovague, 2016) that he became aware of the intrinsic creative potential of the world around us.
Thus, in Les Ombres de nos constellations, he chose to photograph in collaboration with bacteria, letting them express themselves freely, with no further intervention on his part other than their collection and cultivation. In this work, he has brought together the different expressions of the bacteria present on the human body and passed on to us their involuntary art.
Moreover, the scientific aspect that his approach may suggest is simply a gateway to bring the viewer into contact with the microcosm. In this context, it is more a question of bacteria fascinating us and asking us questions, rather than providing us with explanations. They are not the subject of the work; they create the work.
Polyphonies of the Invisible
Since his photographic series Les Ombres de nos constellations (2023), Constantin Schlachter has placed bacteria at the heart of the image, seeking to poetically embrace their diverse expressions. This approach has been facilitated by the creation of his own working tool, a 3D-printed ‘film holder - petri dish’. This device makes it possible to produce chromogenic prints of bacteria in a darkroom, using an enlarger. The bacteria are collected in situ, then grown on glass plates in agar-agar. The plates are then cleaned, leaving only the single print as a record of this involuntary art, a testament to the ephemeral nature of life.
With Polyphonies of the Invisible, the aim is to give voice to the many microscopic actors of life in a forest. Through the exchanges that bacteria allow within and between species, they fundamentally sustain life, in the image of mycorrhizal networks. We can imagine these dialogues, melodies and dissonances intertwining, creating polyphonies invisible to the naked eye. The initial research in this dossier consists of a collection of plants taken from around the artist’s place of residence, in order to quickly test the viability of his device on the plant world. These images will not form part of the final project.
The artist’s initial research explored the bacteria present on the human body. This led to discussions with Patrice Le Pape, Professor of Mycology and Parasitology and Director of UR1155-Iicimed at Nantes University Hospital. Discussions with the professor focused on the role of culture substrates, such as agar, in the proliferation of micro-organisms. Each bacterium has its preferred substrate. It can be transparent, chromogenic or phosphorescent. The artist will be working in collaboration with the scientist to complete this project in 2025.
The research setting will be the forest of Fontainebleau, designated as an ‘artistic reserve’ by imperial decree on 13 April 1861, with the support of the painter Théodore Rousseau and the Barbizon school. The project echoed their aesthetic considerations, extending them to the world of the invisible. It is with them that the artist will create images and reconstitute the microscopic partition of this territory. The aim will be to isolate different bacteria and melodies, and also to take account of the symbioses that occur between them. To achieve this, Constantin Schlachter will be taking samples and prints from the end of winter 2025. The samples will be taken from leaves, roots and branches of different tree species, as well as flowers, mosses and fungi.
Polyphonies of the Invisible is intended as a scientific and aesthetic re-enchantment. It raises awareness of the importance and beauty of micro-organisms in ecosystems and in maintaining biodiversity. Bacteria, fungi and other invisible organisms are essential players in the cycle of life, playing a part in decomposition, soil regeneration and the regulation of air and water quality. The aim of this project is to place them at the heart of the creative process, as composers of the opus incertum that is life.