Cyanotype & Surrealism: Printing Perfume Who in Prussian Blue

Today we made some cyanotype print... a small, sun-powered ritual that felt equal parts experiment and dream. We arranged a few Perfume Who bottles, a piece of lace, and some ferns on coated paper with no real intention. It was an accidental print, the kind where you surrender control and let the sun think for you.

And in that looseness, something beautifully unfolded.

Cyanotype has always carried the quiet electricity of surrealism: unexpected outcomes, unconscious gestures, objects transformed into symbols.

Man Ray, Untitled Rayograph. Gelatin silver photogram, 1922

It reminds us why we’re drawn to Man Ray, whose rayographs turned everyday objects into dream fragments. Instead of camera, only light, shadow, and the courage to let accidents happen. His work told us that the negative space is often more interesting than the visible one.

Rinsing a cyanotype never gets old.The fabric morphs from dull green to smoky gray to deep Prussian blue, as if a dream is surfacing in slow motion. After the print dried, we scanned it digitally and inverted the colors. Inversion made the images feel even closer to surrealist photography:a ghost of a ghost, a shadow turned inside out.

Perfume Who has always existed between the visible and invisible, scent as shape, memory as material, objects as portals. Cyanotype mirrors that logic perfectly. It turns everyday things into strange symbols. It makes the intangible feel physical. It lets accidents speak.

Today’s prints felt like a small homage to the kind of art we love:accidental, dreamlike, imperfect, honest.

And maybe the best thing about cyanotype is its accessibility.You don’t need a darkroom, a camera, or technical knowledge. Just sunlight, coated fabric, and a few objects that matter to you.

... a playground waiting for you in the blue.