I use the term objectograph to describe a photographic process, where an object is placed on an illuminated sheet of glass, the image of the object is transferred via a flat-field lens onto another parallel glass screen. In this case the images of the butterflies are made directly onto photographic paper, there is no inter-negative, the result is a negative print. The equipment is old and probably obsolete, it lies somewhere between a camera and an enlarger.

In this era of the Anthropocene, the motif of the butterfly opens up new questions that go beyond the traditional symbolic or metaphoric readings and signify environmental change. Scientists have shown by gene editing, butterfly wing patterns can be rearranged; red becomes black, matt becomes shiny. And with some genes we see wider variations; eye spots disappear, boundaries shift, stripes blur.

As many species of butterfly become extinct, we could regretfully regard them as ‘icons’ of climate change, because they are attuned to Global Warming. In the UK since 1976 the butterfly population has fallen by about 50%, which is within my lifetime.