© Zachary Copfer, 2012, Bacteriography
"As a former microbiologist recently turned visual artist, I seek to create work that is less of an intersection of art and science and more of a genuine fusion of the two. During my graduate research I invented a new medium that combines photographic process with microbiological practices.
The process is very similar to darkroom photography only the enlarger has been replaced by a radiation source and instead of photographic paper this process uses a petri dish coated with a living bacterial emulsion: a new photographic process that I have coined 'Bacteriography'.
Put simply, this is a process to develop photographs in plates of bacteria. That is to say, the bacteria literally grow to form photographic images. I believe that great beauty and poetry reside within the theories woven by scientists. And that it is through the unification of art and science that these treasures can be fully explored and made accessible to the world at large." (Zachary Copfer)
(thanks to / via: Smithsonian Magazine)