Her beautifully crafted images reflect a holistic system that encompasses the human psyche and finds its metaphors through the natural world. British artist Susan Derges engages with themes of alchemy, testing the inter-relation between the elements of fire, water, earth and air. Her first major series, Chladni Figures, was created by sprinkling powder onto photographic paper made to vibrate with sound, making visible the shapes of invisible sound waves. From 198086 Derges lived and worked in Japan, introducing the influence of Japanese minimalism which she combined with her discovery of camera-less photography techniques. She captures the interference patterns in flowing rivers, the energy of waterfalls and breaking waves and the states of water from ice to cloud, from the solid to the intangible. Subsequent series continued to explore hidden forces and cycles of nature and her most frequently recurring subject is water. She. Derges often uses the landscape at night as her darkroom.