Guias práticos de fotografia experimental: hibridismos da imagem digital com técnicas históricas

Abstract

This research weaves together technique, bibliographic study, practical experimentation, and critical reflection to update the practice of nineteenth-century historical photographic processes, both within teaching environments and in contemporary aesthetic and visual production. It is dedicated to the study and application of historical photographic processes from digital negatives, combining technique and reflection to propose practical guides to beginning artists, teachers, and researchers. Drawing on nearly three decades of experience in the field (in both teaching and image-making), as well as a systematic survey of manuals and references in printed books and online publications, the work maps the current state of knowledge dissemination and identifies gaps, adaptations, and possibilities in the Brazilian context. From this point of interest, guides were developed to look as clear and accessible tools. Their elaboration took place collaboratively, through application and experimentation within the Al-Químicos research group, enabling the recording of procedures, results, and challenges encountered. In this process, the kitchen was re-signified as a space of exchange and photographic alchemy, where the manual handling of chemicals, the waiting time, and the care with materials echo culinary preparation. Inspired by this analogy, the guides adopted a recipe-book model, with lists of ingredients and methods of preparation, making the procedures more intuitive and inviting, while highlighting the artisanal dimension of photographic practice. Activities within the research group generated not only images but also technical and conceptual debates, culminating in exhibitions and projects that functioned as spaces for knowledge exchange and direct encounters between artists, works, and audiences. Historical processes are presented as forms of resistance and deceleration, capable of reconnecting photographic practice to tactile and sensorial experiences that the flux of social media tends to dilute. This reflection also considers hybridities, where the digital and the chemical converge to create new modes of artistic expression, in which the analog is not merely a vestige of the past but a possible future, where physical objects and experiences gain greater significance amid virtual saturation. Thus, this research proposes a return to historical photographic practices not as a nostalgic act but as an aesthetic, political, and sensorial choice—one that offers presence, encounter, and meaning-making in resistance to the accelerated dynamics of the digital world.