Emma Powell is an artist in residence and lecturer at Iowa State University. Her work often examines photography’s history while incorporating historic processes and/or devices within the imagery. For her, photography mirrors human existence by asking “real-life questions from personal dramas to romantic doubts.” The photographic medium is ideal for investigating, for example, the tenuous relationship between sleep and waking and the ephemerality of both life and light, as well as acting as a “medium” for capturing “etherial and chemical” spirits. This series, “An Elegy for the Honey Bee,” (collodion process on acrylic) addresses the decline in bee populations. Working with local beekeepers and an Iowa State University entomologist, Powell captures the complex issues associated with colony collapse disorder. The work attempts, as well, with the mosaic hive piece, to visualize a bee’s compound eye. Find her at   www.emmapowellphotography.com.