Color Bang #45 Photo: Ross Sonnenberg
Color Bang #45
Photo: Ross Sonnenberg
Color Bang #50 Photo: Ross Sonnenberg
Color Bang #50
Photo: Ross Sonnenberg
Color Bang #1 Photo: Ross Sonnenberg
Color Bang #1
Photo: Ross Sonnenberg
Photo: Ross Sonnenberg
Color Bang #29 Photo: Ross Sonnenberg
Color Bang #29
Photo: Ross Sonnenberg
Big Bang #16 Photo: Ross Sonnenberg
Big Bang #16
Photo: Ross Sonnenberg
Color Bang #60 Photo: Ross Sonnenberg
Color Bang #60
Photo: Ross Sonnenberg
Color Bang #41 Photo: Ross Sonnenberg
Color Bang #41
Photo: Ross Sonnenberg
Color Bang #65 Photo: Ross Sonnenberg
Color Bang #65
Photo: Ross Sonnenberg
Color Bang #30 Photo: Ross Sonnenberg
Color Bang #30
Photo: Ross Sonnenberg
Color Bang #51 Photo: Ross Sonnenberg
Color Bang #51
Photo: Ross Sonnenberg
Color Bang #61 Photo: Ross Sonnenberg
Color Bang #61
Photo: Ross Sonnenberg
Strictly speaking, all you need to make a photo is light and a photo-sensitive medium. So why bother with the camera? Ross Sonnenberg doesn’t bother with such things with his Color Bang series, igniting fireworks directly on photo paper with dramatic results.
“Chance is a great part in the work but I use different materials to get different shapes and colors,” says Sonnenberg. “I started with black and white paper then moved on to color paper with which there is more possibilities.”
To make the Color Bang images, Sonnenberg closes his garage door and seals it from all light. lays out the paper face-up on the concrete and lights the fuse. Through trial and error, he has conjured some beautiful abstractions from the unassuming environment of his suburban home. The results remind him of constellations and galaxies.
At the mercy of volatile trajectories, Sonnenberg’s experiments with fireworks—which are illegal in his state—often result in images that don’t turn out. He’s had to move away from conventional processing.
“The color temperature of fireworks are so high I have to develop the work in trays and not send them through a processor which makes it even more difficult,” he says.
Inspired by the photograms of Marco Breuer, Susan Derges and Christopher Bucklow, creating Color Bang has been nothing but a massively fun exercise and—up until this point—one without injury.
“Knock on wood,” says Sonneneberg. “I’ve only had some small burns. I always have a bucket of water and a fire extinguisher nearby. I’ll never use Roman Candles again. If you stick them in a bucket of water when they are still lit, you get hit with exploding water.”
Sonnenberg says now his kids always want to do “art” with him. He keeps them away from the fireworks, however, and will continue to as he intends to ratchet up the explosions with larger pyrotechnics and more work space.
“I want to go bigger, but then everything has to get bigger,” he says.
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