Companions in Quiet
Pictorial Whispers is a deeply personal series of handmade salt prints from calotype paper negatives, created as a way to process the grief of losing my daughter, Abby. Each image explores the quiet emotional terrain of resilience, transformation, and connection through the delicate life cycle of flowers.
Using 19th-century chemistry and vintage soft-focus lenses, I craft every salt print and calotype paper negative by hand—one sheet at a time. The result is a body of work that embraces imperfection, stillness, and emotional presence. These are not documents. They are quiet visual poems—fragile, reflective, and timeless.
“This work is slow because it matters. It was made for quiet looking, for memory, and for those willing to sit with what cannot be understood at a glance. I’m not here to be seen quickly. I’m here to be seen deeply.” — Tim Layton
For Collectors
Original handmade salt prints from my Pictorial Whispers series are available as limited editions. Each print is contact printed by hand in my darkroom from an original whole plate calotype paper negative on 8×10 cotton rag paper.
This is a fully analog process. The calotype paper negative is prepared by hand, exposed in a large format camera, developed in the darkroom, and contact printed as a traditional salt print on cotton rag paper. No digital capture, AI, or digital printing is used to create the finished artwork.
Each salt print is made individually, then carefully inspected, titled, signed, dated, and accompanied by a numbered certificate of authenticity. Small variations in tone, surface, and edge detail are part of the beauty of the process. They are signs of the hand, the paper, the chemistry, and the light.
These are original handmade photographs, not reproductions. They offer collectors a direct connection to one of photography’s earliest and most poetic processes, brought forward through a deeply personal contemporary body of work rooted in grief, memory, and endurance.
Artist Statement for Plate No. 2
This image reflects a moment of unexpected tenderness. I didn’t plan to photograph two flowers, but when I saw them leaning together in near symmetry—each fading in its own way—I felt something shift. There’s a quiet comfort in shared stillness. This print became a meditation on presence and companionship, even in sorrow. Not everything has to be said aloud to be understood.
Creative Process Notes
Made using my 8×10 view camera and an 11½” Wollensak Verito soft-focus lens, this calotype was exposed in soft window light with both flowers placed on the sill. The negative was developed slowly in gallic acid and silver nitrate, with subtle variations in tone revealing themselves only after drying. The light moved quickly that day, which felt like part of the story too—fleeting and fragile.
Reflection / Journal Excerpt
They looked like they were listening to each other. Or maybe just existing side by side without needing to explain anything. I felt that deeply. In grief, the kindest moments are often the quietest ones—when someone simply stays near you.
Artwork & Technical Information
- Title: Pictorial Whispers Plate No. 2 – Companions in the Quiet
- Process: 19th-century 8×10 salt print from original hand-coated whole plate calotype paper negative, contact printed under sunlight.
- Camera: 8×10 view camera
- Lens: 290mm F3 Dallmeyer 3B Petzval
- Development: Gallic acid and silver nitrate
- Date Created: September 27, 2024
- Edition: Available as a limited edition of 100 artist originals or open archival reproductions.
