Workshop: Salt Printing – with Joachim Froese

Two Day Salt Printing Workshop – From Digital File to Print

Join acclaimed photographer Joachim Froese for a two-day workshop exploring one of photography’s most beautiful and tactile historic processes — the salt print.

First presented in 1839 by English polymath Henry Fox Talbot, salt printing was the first widely used photographic process on paper. In this immersive, hands-on workshop, participants will learn how to adapt digital files for alternative printing processes, translating modern photographs into richly textured analogue prints.

The workshop covers every stage of the process: preparing custom-made contact negatives in Photoshop, hand-coating light-sensitive paper, contact printing, and processing prints through toning, washing, fixing, and finishing.

Through demonstrations, guided practice, and discussion, Joachim will share his expertise in combining historical methods with modern technology — highlighting how these intersections expand creative possibilities within photographic art.

Whether you’re a photographer, printmaker, or simply curious about alternative processes, this workshop offers a rare opportunity to slow down, work with your hands, and experience photography in its most elemental form.

The workshop will be accompanied by an artist talk and a small exhibition of Joachim’s work, featuring finished prints as well as work in progress.

TopSpace Studio. Hobart. 29 & 30 November 2025

Joachim Froese is a photographic artist and educator based in Brisbane and Berlin, known for his conceptually driven practice examining how photography shapes our understanding of the world. His work merges contemporary digital technologies with historic printing processes in innovative and increasingly experimental ways.

He has exhibited widely across Australia, Europe, Asia, and North America, with solo shows in major public galleries and participation in international photography festivals. His photographs are held in prominent public collections including the National Gallery of Australia, the National Portrait Gallery of Australia, and the Queensland Art Gallery | Gallery of Modern Art.

Since 2019, his practice has focused in particular on exploring the practical and conceptual possibilities of salt printing. Embracing unpredictability and ephemerality as crucial elements, he now produces unfixed prints that retain a sensitivity to UV light — inviting viewers to see photography not as fixed, but as mutable, shaped by the interplay of light, chemistry, and matter.

Originally trained at the School of Art at Launceston, University of Tasmania in the 1990s  Froese is an experienced educator and Honorary Lecturer at the School of Communication and Arts, University of Queensland. He has taught at universities in Australia and Germany and regularly leads workshops and masterclasses. He holds a PhD (Art) from RMIT in Melbourne for research into photography at the intersection of nature and culture.