Meghann Riepenhoff’s camera-less cyanotypes are created in collaboration with the landscape and the ocean, at the edges of both. Paper coated with homemade cyanotype emulsion are draped along the shore, across branches, or under snow. Rain, waves, wind, and sediment leave physical inscriptions through direct contact with the photographic materials. The works in Riepenhoff’s Littoral Drift series—a geologic term describing the action of wind-driven waves transporting sand and gravel—stems from her fascination with the nature of our relationships to the landscape, the sublime, time, and impermanence. Photochemically, the pieces are never wholly processed, and will continue to slowly respond to the changing environments that they encounter over time.

In 2018, Riepenhoff was awarded a John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation Fellowship. She has additionally been a recipient of a Fleishhacker Foundation Grant (2015), and artist residencies at the Headlands Center for the Arts, Sasusalito, CA; and Banff Centre for the Arts, Canada. Her work is the subject of two monographs: Littoral Drift + Ecotone (2018) and Ice (forthcoming, 2021), both published by Radius Books.