Jill Burkholder and the Bromoil Print

(Above) “Snowman,” bromoil print © Jill Skupin Burkholder Click on image for larger view.

(Above) “Cathedral Chair,” bromoil print © Jill Skupin Burkholder Click on image for larger view.

(Above) “Stairs,” bromoil print © Jill Skupin Burkholder Click on image for larger view.

(Above) “Rain Girl,” bromoil print © Jill Skupin Burkholder Click on image for larger view.

(Above) “Marching Guards,” bromoil print © Jill Skupin Burkholder Click on image for larger view.

(Above) “Baseballs,” bromoil print © Jill Skupin Burkholder Click on image for larger view.

(Above) “Mirror at Terezin,” bromoil print © Jill Skupin Burkholder Click on image for larger view.

(Above) “Lights at Terezin,” bromoil print © Jill Skupin Burkholder Click on image for larger view.

(Above) “Beds at Terezin,” bromoil print © Jill Skupin Burkholder Click on image for larger view.

(Above) “Barracks,” bromoil print © Jill Skupin Burkholder Click on image for larger view.

I JUST FELL IN LOVE WITH THE PHOTOGRAPHIC IMAGES OF JILL SKUPIN BURKHOLDER. It’s not just the old photographic processes she uses— it’s her vision, her photographic eye. These images, which she took in various spots across the world, push ordinary objects into a dreamlike place. Part nightmare, part memory—Burkholder’s images are truly extraordinary.

Burkholder works in the bromoil process, combining a century old technique with new digital approaches. She has taught bromoil’s painterly brush-and-ink techniques in workshops for groups including the Texas Photographic Society, the Academia de Fotografia in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico and Photographers’ Formulary in Montana.

From Wiki: The Bromoil Process was an early photographic process that was very popular with the Pictorialists during the first half of the twentieth century. The soft, paint-like qualities of the prints are very typical for this genre, and have recently led to some art photographers using the process again.

The bromoil process was based on the oil print, whose origins go back to the mid-nineteenth century. A drawback of oil prints was that the gelatin used was too slow to permit an enlarger to be used, so that negatives had to be the same dimensions as the positives. After G.E.H. Rawlins published a 1904 article on the oil print process, E.J. Wall in 1907 described theoretically how it should be possible to use a smaller negative in an enlarger to produce a silver bromide positive, which should then be bleached and hardened, to be inked afterwards as in the oil process. C. Welborne Piper then executed this theory in practice, and so the bromoil process was born.

Jill began working with photography in 1985 studying both traditional and digital photography and experimenting with various alternative photography techniques. She learned the bromoil process from Gene Laughter, a photographer who researched the technique by studying historical writings and interviewing members of The Bromoil Circle of Great Britain. She is a member of the International Society of Bromoilists, a small group of artists working in this elusive medium.

Her images have been published in recent publications, Black and White Camera Craft by William Cheung and Art Business News, “Reborn Victorians.” Her bromoils have been exhibited throughout the U.S and can be found in private and public collections.