Jonathan Polkest

The Solitary Reaper is imagery, multiples, editions and original celebrating the historical alchemical activity of Kelp burning - transforming seaweed into constituent chemicals used in early photographic chemicals, aniline dyes, coloured glass production as well as many medicinal and domestic substances. Principally the images are of Scillonian Kelp Pits, in the Isles of Scilly Cornwall but the process sprang from Brittany and affected the entire western seaboard of Britain, Ireland Scotland and Norway as a source of Soda Ash.