A photogram is a photograph made without a camera: you lay objects directly on a light-sensitive surface, expose it, and each object leaves its silhouette behind. The image is created by simple contact, at the object's actual size, and each print is usually one of a kind.
There are two ways to do it. On black and white photo paper, under a red light, with the same baths used to develop a pinhole print. Or in the sun, on paper coated with the iron salts of the cyanotype process, with no darkroom.
In short, in 5 steps:
- Choose flat objects, opaque or translucent
- Prepare the sensitive surface away from the light
- Press the objects flat under a clean sheet of glass
- Expose under a lamp or in the sun
- Bring out the image, then leave it to dry flat
How a photogram image forms
The object acts as a screen. Where light reaches the sensitive surface, it transforms it. Where the object covers it, nothing happens, and its silhouette stays pale.
On black and white photo paper, the areas that received light turn black in the developer. The object therefore stands out white on a black background: it is a negative image, like the paper negative that comes out of a pinhole camera.
In cyanotype, the exposed areas turn Prussian blue, and the object stays white on a blue background. In both cases, a translucent object lets some of the light through: a feather, a piece of lace or a thin leaf gives intermediate greys or blues, veins included.
Contact decides sharpness. A flat object pressed firmly down gives a crisp outline. A thick or curved object lets light slip under its edges, and its silhouette softens.
The object stops the light: its silhouette stays pale, sharp if it is pressed flat, softer if it is thick.
From Talbot to Man Ray, an image without a camera
The photogram is as old as photography itself. William Henry Fox Talbot was the first to explore it systematically on paper: he laid plants and fabric samples on a sensitised sheet, under glass, in the sun.
Talbot quickly realised that these negative images could be copied by contact onto a second sensitive sheet to obtain a positive. That simple step opened the way to reproducing photographs.
The botanist Anna Atkins took up the same technique with cyanotype, whose Prussian blue images develop in water. Her book on British algae, published from 1843 onwards, is illustrated with these images made by simple contact.
In the 20th century, the avant-garde seized on it. László Moholy-Nagy experimented with it from 1922. That same year, Man Ray published Champs délicieux (in French), an album of twelve “rayographs” with a preface by Tristan Tzara, rayograph being the name he gave his photograms.
A rayograph, or rayogram, is therefore simply a photogram, named after Man Ray. Other camera-free images exist, such as the luminogram, where light is directed through glass or cut paper, or the chemigram, which works the surface of photo paper in full light with the baths, varnishes or wax. The photogram remains the most widespread technique.
Composing a cyanotype photogram: the flowers are laid on the coated, dry paper before being pressed flat under glass.
Making a photogram on photo paper
Black and white photo paper is barely sensitive to red. You can therefore handle it under a red safelight, in a bathroom where you have blocked out any daylight.
Place the sheet sensitive side up, arrange your objects, then cover everything with a clean sheet of glass. Next, switch on an ordinary lamp for a few seconds; a simple desk lamp is enough. The further away it is, the longer the exposure, so the right duration depends on the lamp and its distance: start with a test strip, uncovering an offcut of paper in successive sections.
The sheet then goes through the usual baths: developer, a water stop bath, fixer, then a long rinse. Once dry, it is no longer affected by light, since the fixer has dissolved the silver salts that were still sensitive. The Sténoflex mini-lab already contains what you need for this: ten sheets of photographic paper, the developer, the fixer and a red safelight film.
You get a negative image. To have dark objects on a light background, simply print it in turn by contact onto a fresh sheet, exactly as Talbot did.
An analogue photogram dries on a rack; the objects have left their pale silhouettes in the emulsion.
Making a photogram in cyanotype
Cyanotype is prepared under ordinary indoor lighting, out of the sun. You coat watercolour paper with the mixture of the two iron salts, ferric ammonium citrate and potassium ferricyanide, then leave it to dry in the dark. Potassium ferricyanide has low toxicity at the amounts used in the process, but it can release cyanide on contact with an acid, or under UV light when in solution.
The objects are laid on the dry paper, under glass. You expose in the sun, from a few minutes in high summer to several tens of minutes under an overcast sky. The cue is visual: the surface changes from yellow-green to a bronzed blue-grey.
Rinsing in cold water, until it runs clear, reveals the white silhouettes. The blue deepens further as it dries. For foliage and flowers, the detailed method to print plants in cyanotype goes further into choosing your plants.
If you would rather not measure out the chemistry yourself, the Sténoflex cyanotype kit brings together the two iron salts, ten sheets of watercolour paper, two pipettes and instructions.
Flower cyanotype made by Éric Marais: where the flowers covered the paper, it stays white.
Choosing your objects well
Flat objects with clear outlines give the most readable silhouettes: leaves, feathers, lace, paper cut-outs, keys. Transparent or translucent objects, such as glass or a light fabric, add halftones.
In workshops, beginners are often seen overloading their sheet. It is better to use a few objects, well spaced out, and let the background breathe: a photogram lives on the contrast between shape and empty space.
On photo paper, you can also play with time. Removing an object halfway through the exposure gives a grey silhouette rather than a white one, and overlapping several objects creates different tones depending on how much light each lets through. Left in the sun without developer, the same paper gives a lumen print, in pink or purple tones.
The photogram is often the first image people make with their own hands, and it is a fine way to learn. You see light writing, with nothing between it and the paper, and you suddenly understand what a pinhole camera or a negative then does.
A few flat objects, well spaced out: a photogram lives on the contrast between shape and empty space.
Header image: William Henry Fox Talbot, leaf, salted paper print, around 1839. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. Public domain.
Éric Marais — Photographer, author of two books on pinhole photography (published by Pearson) and creator of the Sténoflex. He has run introductory workshops in alternative photography, from pinhole to cyanotype, from the very beginning.