Since the late 1960s, Bea Nettles has been among the vanguard of photographers using alternative processes and mixed media. At the time, few textbooks or classes gave instruction on making photographs beyond standard black-and-white gelatin silver prints. Nettles said, “Because I had no clear directions to follow or was not given a demonstration, I broke the rules.” In Swan Dream, a collage of swans and a blurred self-portrait combine to create a surreal, otherworldly image. The couch and quilt have been hand-colored, further contributing to Nettles’s handmade aesthetic in this curious, dreamlike composition.