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Mark



Jon Baker uses a self-made bespoke camera to photograph small objects at a very large scale. With this camera, which he calls a Macro Obscura, Jon is able to make analogue negatives (to be converted to positives) that are over two metres wide. This means the photographic quality is incredibly high, and gives the images a unique presence.


His subjects include plants, insects and sweets that he has modified in order to disrupt the objects’ cultural meanings. For example, Jon chews and spits out jelly sweets, leaving teeth marks and saliva on them, then letting them grow mould. This changes their innocent and childlike qualities. The photographs also become evidence of his body and the surfaces he has touched.



Jon believes that encountering small objects at a scale proportionate to the human body changes the viewer’s relationship to both the subject and themselves. He aims for the recognisable to be made unexpected through his photographic techniques.













Exhibitions

The Idealist and the Contrarian Serpentine Cinema 2019

Piss,Plants, Plastic,  2018

Magic Control,  2017

Catlin Art Prize Finalist 2015


ART 15 UAL 

Photofusion, Solo show, February 2015

Inclusion in Catlin Guide 2015

Art for youth 2014

Saatchi Sensations, 2014

Exposure 14 Award, Parasol unit, 2014

Final show at Chelsea College 2014