BACK TO LIGHT (2010-doorlopend) / BIOGRAPHS (2009)
Caleb Charland is fascinated by the simplicity of the fruit battery: by pushing a galvanised nail into one side of an orange – or another type of fruit or vegetable – and a copper wire into the other side, electricity is generated. Charland uses these fruit batteries to build light installations that illuminate themselves for the photographs of his work in progress BACK TO LIGHT. The images appeal to our sense of curiosity about how the world works and the concerns about the future of the world’s energy sources. With his photographs, Charland shows that the possibilities for alternative and sustainable energy sources are endless. In BIOGRAPHS, Charland exposes a photographic film with solid fields of colour and coated this with a nutrient source before adding bacteria. Once the bacteria had eaten their way through it, the films had transformed into abstract landscapes.
