I experimented with Kirlian photography, which has been used to examine the aura of plants.
Kirlian photography captures electrical coronal discharges, which are produced by applying high frequency high voltage electricity to the photographic subject. In other words, it is a contact print of the ionization and luminescence of vapors emitted from the photographic subject. The non-camera process and resulting images, which were fascinating, became associated with the mysterious term “aura.” In fact, however, the resulting images differ depending on the thickness of the photographic subject, the amount of water in it, and conditions of the environment in which the subject is photographed. In these images, there is a material reality, which differs from visually perceived reality. The images are traces of the labor that produced them. In this series, I selected images that Kirlian photographers would most likely have labeled failures.