Yelena Zhavoronkova

Living in Northern California for 25 years I was not aware of harsh climate of beautiful Lake County until recently. It is an amazing place with stunning landscapes, very hot summers and quite cold winters. Not many regular California plants could survive and prosper there. There is only a couple of native trees proven to be right for the area, and the grasses are very strong and adoptive. To continue the genome process in these extreme circumstances, nature has developed it’s special way to do so by creating the strong vessels to save the seeds of the future generations and hold them until the conditions are right to spread them around. These vessels – cones, pods, acorns – have an extremely powerful presence and contain an immense beauty, which drawn me to start this “THE SEEDS” series and celebrate the beauty of the nature.

ABOUT PLATINUM / PALLADIUM PRINT PROCESS
Recently I fell in love with the Platinum/Palladium printing process, one of the oldest and the most durable photographic methods ever existed. It’s unique qualities, such as an enormously broad tonal range and absolutely non-reflective surface, gave me an exciting opportunity to revise my whole approach to the photography itself, from conception to the final print. Each print is one-of-the-kind, printed on hand-coated 100% cotton watercolor rag paper with carefully chosen exposition and developing time.