Cyanotype Making With Rosalva Willow

This past April, Del Rio Trail artist ambassador, Rosalva Willow, led a cyanotype workshop next to the Del Rio Trail. To boost excitement and awareness about the new trail and the public artwork which will be installed along it, we hosted the workshop at the future site of Janet Zweig’s permanent Del Rio Trail sculpture.

Rosalva started the workshop by providing a brief history of cyantope photography. Next she demonstrated the cyantope process. It starts with choosing plants or other objects to place on a surface prepped with emulsion. Once she created the composition, she let them expose in the sunshine shine for 5 - 10 minutes. The longer the surface is exposed the deeper the blue of the final cyanotype. After the paper is exposed, Rosalva rinses it in water to reveal the image!

These are what the cyanotypes look like after they are exposed! Participants hung their final pieces along a line to dry.