Photo What?
Well, photo encaustic. Or simply, mixed media plus photography. Photo encaustic is the technique of combining mixed media (primarily melted beeswax) with a photograph to create a unique look; one that is an ethereal, a one-of-a-kind image with a mysterious look to it. The beeswax creates a layer which slightly diffuses the photograph. Even if I make two of the same, each will look a bit different.
I use two techniques. One is a pigment-print (archival) photograph mounted to a substrate (usually a pre-made "cradle") then applying beeswax in several layers, often enhanced with oil paint. The other is, printing my image on archival tissue paper, embedding it into a few layers of beeswax, adding more layers of beeswax, and usually enhancing with oil paint. With this method, I can create several "slices" of a photo to create a large piece, by carefully placing them together. As you can imagine, this is a tricky method.
This explanation probably makes no sense to you, so have a look at my encaustic images to see what I mean! They are under FINE ART on my site.
Your post made me think back to the summer I spent in my grandparents’ attic, rummaging through boxes of old photographs that seemed to have no context at all. I found a faded Polaroid of a smiling stranger holding a camera, the caption barely legible: “Photo What?” I stared at it for minutes, wondering who they were and why they’d captured that moment https://www.sahealth.sa.gov.au/ It turned into a small obsession; I spent evenings trying to match faces to names, tracing family trees, and even asking relatives about the mysterious photographer. In the end, I discovered it was my great‑uncle, an amateur who loved snapping candid shots of everyday life, but never labeled his work. The whole experience reminded me how…