Avocado (Persea americana) anthotype by Arindam Majumdar

“The Father as a Boy” by Arindam Majumdar, Indianapolis, Indiana, USA
Parts used: Skin
Amount: The skin of 20 (!) avocados
Extracted by: Soak in water overnight, then boil avocado skins for an hour, then filter with a cloth
Solvent: Tap water
Application: Laying watercolour paper on a tray of avocado extract overnight to saturate

Layers: 1
Substrate: Arches watercolour paper 11″ x 14″
Created with: A black-and-white print was converted to a scan to make a positive transparency
Exposure: 3 weeks of sunny days in August 2026
Temperature: 16-32° Celsius or 61-90° Fahrenheit
Contrast: ✿✿ (Medium)
Challenges or observations: I used avocados from a grocery store. Boiling the avocado skins produced a pink-to-purple emulsion. The coloured border shows the original saturation of the avocado-skin-dyed paper. The purple emulsion is due to the presence of cyanidin 3-O-glucoside, a molecule belonging to the anthocyanin family. The contact frame was assembled by sandwiching the dyed watercolour paper, image transparency and a mat to create a border.
Additional information: The anthotype “The Father as a Boy” was made using an old family photograph of my dad. The source image came from an old black-and-white print photograph from the family album, which was taken several decades ago. The artwork invites us to consider what our parents were like as individuals when they were young, before they adopted the parental personas through which we know them.
Instagram: @arindam_dream_no9