Leafminers
Silver Gelatin Photograms, 2010
One year, in late summer, I became slightly obsessed with the beautiful trails left in foliage by leafminers. These tiny caterpillars munch their way through the insides of leaves, growing bigger along with the tracks they make, until at last they eat their way out, pupate and fly away. The lines seem random to a casual observer but each species makes its own characteristic pattern; a design created by instinctively following a set of unwritten rules, and limitations imposed by the physical geography of its particular micro-habitat.