Layers is a three-part, art-centered workshop exposing the enculturation of care work and caregiving through the process of cyanotype - light, object, chemistry,
and what emerges when we sit with the
hidden layers of care work.
How we were shaped to give care.
How we were taught to disappear inside of it.
How caregiving became obligation, a way to belong, and unpaid labor.
This is not just about caregiving.
Layers is about what we were trained to do - in our families, in our cultures, in our bodies.
Layers is for those who have lived inside care work.
Layers is for those who became “the one who handles it.”
Layers is to honor the women and non-binary ancestors who had no choice but to be a care worker.
We are not here to romanticize care work, nor to demonize it.
We are here to look at it clearly. The expectations and the agreements
we never wanted to consent to.
This is a space to learn the art of cyanotype, deepen your skills, be in the mess of making without judgment, and use the process to express caregiver and care workers’ stories.
LAYERS: Inheritance of Care Work, in Blue
A cyanotype workshop to expose the enculturation of carework
led by Narinder Bazen and Venessa Greenheron.
June 14, June 28, July 12
7–9 PM ET
Registration closes May 31
Fee: $200 (that includes all materials)
Early bird offer: $175 if registered by May 10th.
Use code Layers for that discount.
20 spaces available
*2 full scholarship seats are reserved for Black, Indigenous, and people of color, as well as non-binary folks, in support of those most impacted by care work.
To enter the scholarship lottery, please email: care@narinderbazen.com
Why This Exists
Care work is everywhere, and still, it largely goes unnoticed.
Many care workers are shaped into carers. We’re taught to anticipate, to tend, to keep track of others, and to do so without keeping track of what it costs us to give care.
Many care workers and caregivers were never asked if they wanted the role.
It was expected of them.
This culture depends on care work and, at the same time, makes it invisible.
We cannot name all of the parts of the care workers and caregivers role.
There are too many layers.
We can make it visible to ourselves. We can pull back the clouds just enough to stand in a kind of light and see what has shaped us.
Through cyanotype, we work with exposure, light, time, object, and letting go.
Layers is not about telling a perfect story about caregiving or finding a way to fix unwanted situations.
It’s about stepping out of the role and looking at the conditions that made it.
The Art: Cyanotype
We will be working with cyanotype, an early photographic process that uses sunlight to develop deep, luminous blues.
Exposure. Water. Object. Time. Letting Go.
Images don’t get “made” so much as they are revealed.
Objects leave their trace.
Light does the rest.
In this space, your caregiver experiences won’t be carried through long narratives.
They will be expressed, imprinted through the blue, with words arriving in their own time.
The Two Pieces
You will create two cyanotype works:
Piece One: The Overshadowed Self
Made in the mess of learning the process.
Made in the mess of the enculturation.
What in you was covered?
What disappeared?
Piece Two: The Caregiver Revealed
A second piece that brings you forward.
Not as a role, but as self.
In cyanotype, the image doesn’t appear immediately.
It emerges through exposure.
Witnessed.
You do not have to have any prior experience
with cyanotype making.
In our first meeting, our art teacher and guide Venessa will be teaching us how the process works.
carefully placed over
the Summer Solstice arc
Over the threshold of the Summer Solstice, we will invite the intense light to illuminate the deepest layers of our enculturation into care. The sun at its highest peak becomes a co-creator to burn away obscuring clouds, allowing us to examine what is revealed there.
Through intention and repetition, this art practice becomes alchemical ritual.
Using sympathetic magic we bring our stories into the light,
placing objects of meaning onto the page to be swaddled in blue.
The Materials
A full cyanotype kit will be mailed directly to your home.
You do not need to source anything.
Inside your box:
Carefully chosen fabric and paper
Cyanotype chemicals
Tools for applying the chemicals
Small vials of cyanotype reactives curated by Venessa Greenheron
A linen pouch filled with trinkets: flora, fauna, and small whimsical objects to work with
Some of these materials may come from Venessa’s farm on Whidbey Island.
You simply sign up.
We take care of the rest.
Gallery Nights
We will hold two salon-style gallery spaces within our time together.
Places to witness one another’s work and thoughts.
There will be no critique or performance. Just gentleness.
Meet the Creators
of Layers
Narinder Bazen
Narinder has served caregivers for over a decade and has been one herself… in one way or another, pretty much her whole life.
Her relationship to care work was shaped early: in a fundamentalist church / school, and at home, where girls were trained to tend to others before tending to themselves.
She knows the ways a person can disappear out of necessity inside caregiving, and what it takes to return.
She will teach on the history of care work and lead restorative conversations and guided imaginative journeys.
Founder of the Nine Keys School of Death Arts
Artist, death midwife, and spiritual counselor
Venessa Greenheron
Venessa, a Nine Keys alum, lives and works on a farm and brings a deep relationship to land and material.
She will teach:
The history of cyanotype
The etymology
The science and the magic
A detailed process of how to work with cyanotypes.
Venessa serves her community on Whidbey Island, Washington as a death worker and artist.
Prism Deathcare
Artist, death midwife, and land stewardYour Questions, Answered
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A cyanotype workshop for caregivers
June 14, June 28, July 12
7–9 PM ET
Registration closes May 31 -
Layers will be held on Zoom.
You are encouraged to be in a quiet and cozy place at home.Once you sign up, you will receive access to our member page where the link to our Zoom time will be available.
A newsletter will also be sent before each meeting. It will include the link for Zoom.
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This event will not be recorded. The preciousness of our time together happens in real-time.
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We understand that scheduling can be challenging for caregivers.
We greatly appreciated your attendance at all three meetings.
The meetings will not be recorded.
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The cost of Layers is $200.
Once you sign up, your payment is non-refundable.
The early bird rate is $175 - if sign up has been completed by May 10th.
There are no payment plans.
The cost of this event supports two artists and death workers.
