The first edition of The Tsushima Cyanotypes was published with Soft Grain Books in Vancouver, BC in 2024, originally published under the pseudonym KC Ahonen.
From the Publisher:
“We live in a world marked by the convergence between the analog and the digital. Much of our lives today are lived in a digital simulated reality of video conferencing lobbies, social media doom scrolls, and video game chatrooms. What happens when the very real, authentic experiences that form our identities occur within these digital spaces? Can they be celebrated and treated with the same appreciation with which we address any other precious moment in our lives?
The Tsushima Cyanotypes is a series by KC Ahonen that explores these feelings at the intersection of lived and simulated experience. Throughout 2020-2022, Ahonen explored a video game world based on a real-world island in southern Japan. By having access to this virtual space during a global pandemic, which prevented the artist from leaving his home, this digital island became Ahonen’s temporary new home, acting as a space where life could still feel as if it was moving forward when so much of the world had come to a stop. Throughout his time on the island, Ahonen made photographs of the places he would see, printing them as cyanotypes, which he feels help blur the line between reality and fiction. The result is over 30 completed prints contained in this first edition volume, along with a statement from the artist.”
The Tsushima Cyanotypes is currently available for purchase through Soft Grain Books.
