Statement:
In my works on paper, I approach each growing thing with equal importance regardless of whether it is a weed, rare species, wildflower, or cultivated flower. I combine several species fused into single compositions, often to the point where the exact plants depicted are open to interpretation. I create unique blue and white cyanotype prints onto sheets of cotton paper and then I paint in countless layers of watercolor, gouache and ink. The cyan imagery becomes the underpainting or grisaille and then I meticulously paint the exposed watercolor paper with a multitude of layers of color. I am most interested in creating objects that feel both beautiful and mysteriousI want each painting to be familiar yet slightly outside of time.

These works will always symbolize resilience to me. I want the content of the work to be a powerful experience. Not only because of the historical moment that they were made, but the process speaks to a kind of gutting and reconstituting. There's an object, then a ghost of the object, and then the reassertion of the object. But the final thing isn't the object, it can't be, just a record of my will to bring it back. And somehow, that will is more satisfying, more encouraging, than had I magically been able to bring the original object back. It is deeply satisfying to take something that is ephemeral and represent it in a way that can live on forever.

In the summer of 2015, I moved from Brooklyn to a hundred-year-old house in Hudson Valley, along with my husband, Sean Hemmerle. Four weeks later, I gave birth to our daughter, Magnolia. Instead of a baptism for the baby, we organized a tree planting ceremony and positioned a magnolia tree in our front yard, including the placenta as fertilizer. This small act was the beginning of my intimate connection to plants growing in our yard. After the birth of our son August in 2018, we had a similar ceremony with a dogwood tree in our back yard.

Cyanotype Process:
Cyanotype is a camera-less printing process invented in 1842 by scientist and astronomer, Sir John Hirschel, which produces a cyan-blue print when a chemistry-coated surface is exposed to sunlight. The first artist (who was also a botanist) to use this process was Anna Atkins. I manipulate physical impressions of plants grown locally in my Hudson Valley garden and other nearby areas, along with intricately cutout photographic negatives. Each selected flower/plant is preserved through a pressing process in which I dissect and shape each form—akin to a specimen from a natural history museum—and then lay everything out in massive flat files in my attic studio. Given that sunlight starts the exposure process with cyanotype chemistry, I carefully arrange elaborate compositions at night and utilize long exposures under natural or UV light to create the final prints. Each cyanotype is unique and cannot be replicated in the way I work.

Nocturnal Nature:

Nocturnal Nature is a body of work by artist Julia Whitney Barnes that pairs the architectural splendor of the Cesar Pelli-designed windows and atrium of Brookfield Place’s Winter Garden, with inspiration from the space’s interior grove of palm trees, which was designed by Diana Balmori, the late wife of Cesar Pelli. Whitney Barnes’ work—exhibited on the first floor of Brookfield Place, steps from the Winter Garden—is composed of a series of framed works on paper that combine watercolor and gouache paintings on cyanotype printed watercolor paper. The imagery depicts botanical arrangements with geometric patterns and the property’s grand atrium windows revealing various skies alluding to different seasons and times of day. The Washington robusta palm trees planted in the Winter Garden appear to grow right out of the floor, and similarly, Whitney Barnes’ botanicals burst from the implied floor patterns in her artwork. Particularly during these cold winter months, Whitney Barnes’ incorporation of natural elements within her work—sun, flowers, plants, water, and air— brings the promise of spring to this interior hallway, as well as a sense of growth and transformation.

Through her use of cyanotype, Whitney Barnes manipulates physical impressions of plants grown locally in her Hudson Valley home garden, and other nearby areas, along with intricately cutout photographic negatives. Each selected flower is preserved through a pressing process in which the artist dissects and shapes each form—akin to a specimen from a natural history museum—and then lays everything out in massive flat files in her attic studio. Given that sunlight starts the exposure process with cyanotype chemistry, the artist carefully arranges elaborate compositions at night and utilizes long exposures under natural or UV light to create the final prints. The digital renderings of the Winter Garden atrium windows and floor that Whitney Barnes designed, were based on an image taken by her husband and professional photographer, Sean Hemmerle. After creating a multi-part negative based on the glazing and metal supports of the atrium’s architecture, Whitney Barnes meticulously painted the exposed watercolor paper with multiple layers of watercolor and gouache. Each cyanotype is created by the power of light, inspiring viewers to look at these very recognizable images in new and different ways.