Pradip began working with new chrysotype when he was asked to test the process during the early days of Dr. Mike Ware formulating his recipes. He produced several images including one of my favourites, Dill flower, Irkutsk, Siberia as shown above.

Pradip’s photographic work considers the experience of loss and how it serves as a catalyst for regeneration. His work in Haiti that is captured in The Third Heaven conveys a narrative of disorder and resuscitation and themes of tenacity and resourcefulness. From Where Loss Comes is about female genital cutting and sacrifice, a photographic collaboration with the late Sarah Mwaga, founder of the Anti-Female Genital Mutilation Network in Tanzania. The collaboration seeded when Malde and Mwaga first met and after discussing their work, discovered there was potential for a mutual project.

For From Where Loss Comes, Pradip photographed hand-forged cutting tools used by the ngaribas (Swahili for circumcisers) and collected by Mwaga.[1] The images, photographed on 8" x 10" film and printed with platinum and palladium, provide insight into the pain that is covered and felt in isolation, and a cultural and traditional practice that clash with fundamental human rights.[2] In 2018, Pradip received a John Simon Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship in recognition of this work.

To see more of Pradip’s portfolio of work, please visit https://pradipmalde.com/

To read more about Pradip’s approach to chrysotype, click here to purchase a copy of Chrysotype: A Contemporary Guide to Photographic Printing in Gold

To learn more about photographic printing with platinum and palladium see the recently released book by Pradip with Dr. Mike Ware Platinotype Making Photographs in Platinum and Palladium with the Contemporary Printing-out Process

[1] Hamman, Henry. Chronicler of Loss, Sewanee The University of the South, http://new.sewanee.edu/features/chronicler-of-loss/

[2] https://pradipmalde.com/from-where-loss-comes/