Charlotte Smithson is an artist living and working in Manchester, UK.
Through her practice Charlotte explores ecology and our relationships with nature and landscapes. She follows her ideas through immersive installation, drawing, photography and plant studies. Working with cameraless and darkroom photography is an expanding area of interest in her work. She experiments with plant based, sustainable alternatives to toxic darkroom chemistry to process 35mm film and print photographs.
Charlotte Smithson has exhibited across the UK including at the Garden Museum, RHS Chelsea, National Trust Sissinghurst, End of the Road festival, The Whitworth and has collaborated with Manchester Metropolitan University, the National Trust and the Oak Project in partnership with Yorkshire Sculpture Park, the University of Derby’s Nature Connectedness Research Group.
Sustainability
Smithson is interested in concepts of circularity and connection, which is reflected in her systems of making. Her circular and sustainable approach ensures component parts are reused, recycled, repaired, preserved or returned to the Earth as nourishment for soil, through composting.
Her social practice invites communities and groups to connect with nature through creativity. Charlotte leads creative wellbeing workshops and collaborative co-design projects - her areas of interest include creative recovery, circular and sustainable design methodologies, and biomimicry.
Plants x Plants
I am excited to share my first series of black and white limited edition giclee printed photographs of plants, developed by plants.
My analogue photography practice applies sustainable approaches to developing 35mm film. I hand make non-toxic plantbased darkroom chemistry from recipes I have developed myself. I source ingredients found in the landscapes where my photographs are taken and enjoy the organic connection between the materials, chemistry and subject matter incorporated in making these images.
The first collection of photographs available in my Plants x Plants series are Rosebuds, Cranesbill, Erigeron, Cornflower and Rudbekia
“My installations display pieces of nature like a museum would exhibit its treasured collection; carefully mounted with space around each stem”
~ Charlotte Smithson, interview by The Telegraph, 2019
