Unfold: Xinyue Tao Reimagines the Darkroom as a Site of Memory and Making

Unfold is a long-term photographic project by Xinyue Tao that treats the darkroom not as a space of reproduction, but as a site of material intervention, memory, and transformation. Combining traditional black-and-white enlarging with photogram processes, the work foregrounds hands-on image-making and positions photography as something mutable rather than fixed.

Rooted in sustained darkroom practice, Unfold revisits film photographs taken over several years and subjects them to direct physical engagement. Tao enlarges her images and then intervenes through scratching, masking, layering, and embedding objects onto the photographic paper. These gestures allow materials to interact with the image surface, leaving traces that carry their own histories and associations. Absence and blank areas within the photographs are shaped by matter, while the image is completed through contact rather than depiction.

Photogram processes play a central role in the project. Physical objects are placed directly onto light-sensitive paper during exposure, allowing them to register as shadows, interruptions, or distortions within the frame. These interventions extend beyond flat prints, with photographs and objects later assembled into framed works or installations. Each piece is handmade and one of a kind, shaped by material decisions that cannot be replicated.

Individual works within Unfold are anchored in specific moments of memory. Unfold-137 (2025) began with Tao encountering the number 137 in London, the same bus number she took home daily as a child. During printing, glass marbles were placed over the image while enlarging. As objects associated with childhood, the marbles partially obscure the photograph, mirroring the way memories return as layered and incomplete rather than whole. The work holds past and present in quiet contact, not as a resolved moment but as something continuously folding.

In Unfold-Spooning (2025), Tao draws on the intimacy of two bodies lying together, using a spoon as a vessel holding a glass candy. The pairing of objects introduces a tension between tenderness and fragility, reflecting how material contact can suggest closeness while remaining vulnerable. In both works, meaning emerges through touch, pressure, and placement rather than narrative description.

The project has been nurtured through Tao’s involvement with Darkroom London, where it developed through experimentation, workshops, and community exchange. Unfold recently culminated in its first darkroom group exhibition, where two works were presented as framed installations.

Based in London, Tao’s wider practice explores time, space, memory, and self-identity through photography and experimental forms. Unfold reflects her commitment to slow, embodied processes and to photography as a living surface, one where the past can be reopened, altered, and experienced again through material engagement.

Artist links
Website: https://www.xinyuetao.com
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/xinyue_txy