Covid 19 Still Life 2021

This is an ambrotype still life created with a camera and lens from around 1900. I wanted to do a traditional pandemic-themed tableau in the style and sensibility of the 19th century, complete with medical ephemera and memento mori. At the center is a used vial of Moderna vaccine, surrounded by medical masks, gloves, antique bottles of alcohol and disinfectant, a frame containing bat skeleton bones, and in keeping with a true memento mori, a replica of a human skull. The intent of this piece is to connect our modern time with pandemics past, connecting our current challenges with their historic antecedents.

Photo by Bill Steber
Carbon print from wet plate collodion ambrotype