Tess Foley (b.2002) is an artist and a writer. Through a curious, process-led approach, her practice sits within a broader network of artists working with photography as an expanded medium. Previous exhibitions of her work include group shows in Bristol at The Island, F-Block Gallery, and the People’s Republic of Stokes Croft. 

Five years ago, I left my home and family for a self-imposed life in Bulgaria, an attempt to outrun a period of depression that had shaped much of my early adulthood. In October 2025, I returned to the same route, travelling for three weeks in a van with my father, photographing the landscape we moved through together. What began as a return to a geographical terrain has since evolved into Crystal Garden: an investigation into the aperiodic experience of continuing to live in the company of sadness. 

Since returning, the work has been developed through a combination of darkroom printing and material experimentation, exploring how a physical support and a printed photograph can enter into conversation with one another. The iterative, detail-obsessed nature of my approach to printing is not driven toward perfection, but toward a spacious tonal palette that can meet and complement the poetic register of these images. 

Alongside completed works, Crystal Garden remains an ongoing research-led project exploring patination techniques on steel, processes more commonly applied to copper-based materials. Through oxidation, deliberate misuse, and material sensitivity, the work seeks to locate beauty in change, instability, and ongoing transformation.