Artist Statement
Time and Time Again
Bean Hollow State Beach, Pescadero, California
This series explores the unique geological features and quiet rhythms of time along the Northern California coast. I’m drawn to the coastal formations shaped by cycles of erosion and tidal return- stones etched by water, patterned voids in tafoni rock, and the stillness of a tide pool.
This is part of a larger inquiry into how landscapes hold memory, not as a fixed record, but as something slowly rewritten, weathered, and reframed. Through these images, I hope to offer viewers a space to pause and consider the beauty of impermanence and the quiet passing of time in nature.
Using the cyanotype alternative photographic process, these toned prints capture the sculptural forms of rock and tide pools. The cyanotype method allows me to extend the dialogue between material and image. The brushstrokes, emulsion edges, and tonal qualities mirror the textures they depict, creating a space for reflection on what is slowly carved, shaped, and left behind.
This series extends my broader exploration of how memory and experience are embedded in material form – whether in the surface of a rock, a photograph, or the hand-worked marks of pigment. In my practice, I apply historical processes, handwork, and photographic layering to explore ways in which time connects both landscape and self. There is a dialogue here between natural erosion and intentional mark-making – a sense that our minds are in conversation with the land.
Barbara Beck
© The Photographer's Eye: A Creative Collective
