London-based artist Nat Faulkner presented his first major UK institutional exhibition.
As the winner of Camden Art Centre’s Emerging Artist Award at Frieze in 2024, Faulkner’s works continued his engagement with the materials and processes of analogue photography, in which his studio – both ‘dark room’ and site of discovery – appears as a spectral presence and autonomous collaborator.
Derived from the Latin name for nitric acid, aqua fortis, the show’s title, Strong water, references the artist’s fascination with chemistry and transformation. Iodine – a light-sensitive element that played a key role in early photography – and light – the generative agent of all photography – take centre stage in the opening room of the exhibition. Bottled in bespoke vessels, an iodine solution transforms the space, bathing it in an orange-tinged hue as natural light filters through from the Victorian skylights above.
