Tag: printmaking

Eels .. a start.

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I am completely fascinated by these slippery, mysterious creatures and their extraordinary life cycle. They are one of the subjects in my very long, 2015, to-do list. I have drawn some eels before, long ago to illustrate Philip Gross’ poem “Sargasso”. I had been thinking about another interpretation of the poem for a small book.

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But meanwhile I am playing with all sorts of printing methods and wanted to make a simple concertina book for a bit more simple bookbinding practice.

I started with some sketches:

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They do have teeth… awesome!

Then made a couple of simple plates cut from card. I had made some card plates for the moon project but they were not terribly successful. Now I have made up some of my own shellac which I think will help.

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Sketch and plates

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Trials with different weights of ink

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A first folded print Then I made a small simple case for the book. I say simple but it is tricky to get everything square, to stop the ink smudging and to keep everything clean. I printed some foliage for a quick cover, wrestled with some old wood type for the title and printed the back of the eel to tidy that aspect up a bit before pasting the print to the front cover.

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The case cover

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The back
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Opened book There are a million things wrong with this but it is a small triumph for me and number two small book form for this year. I am trying to make one a week.   Last week I used an old frog print, folded it and made two separate boards.

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The folded book

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The front and back boards

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The opened out print.

I have to consider this an experiment .. but good practice. See more here.

Moths…and an M.A.

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The last few weeks have been extra, extra busy.. with another excellent sun drenched trip to Amsterdam, our last Easton meeting for this year and the consequences of my decision return to study. Study ?…Yes! I need more.
Learning stuff is, without doubt, my drug of choice. It can be almost anything and I am never happier than when deeply immersed in reading, research and visual experimentation.
Over the last few years I have been on just a maintenance dose, a bit of a drip feed of new ideas and practice. But earlier in the summer I decided to give in and go for the full shot.
So I am studying for an M.A. in Book Arts and Illustration at Anglia Ruskin University, just for the sheer delightful delight of doing it.
My art practice is going to get a good shake out and possibly a good kicking. Just two weeks in now and the brain is beginning to crank into life again.  “Go brain!”…. I will post something of my progress as things develop.

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Moths and the blogging dilemma
Printmaking will play a central role in my study and the printmaking experiments are continuing, so with the set of Fenland images in mind  I’ve been posting intermittently about some experimental Moth prints over on Beautiful Beasts.

To blog or not to blog? Blogging about things often presents me with a dilemma. Recently I have been experimenting and reading, so the images, such as they are, are not that special and I am often reluctant to post experiments lest the casual viewer, who has not read the text, thinks that:- a:They are finished images (unlikely) or, b: That I love the images and am super proud of them.(even less likely)

At the moment it’s not so much the images as the experiments that I’m interested in. Some images are just marks on paper or cut shapes which don’t make for good blogging, but to get back into sharing my thoughts which I have to do over the next two years and to also plug the yawning gap in the blog, here are a few stages of the moth trials…..

Although not part of the M.A. directly, I have been looking at Fenland moths in connection with Willow trees and started off with a few sketches of general moth shapes..an amazing variety I find! These are locally recorded moths so encompass the Great Fen area as well as our small hilly plateau.

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Many Moths …pencil on A4 sketchbook. and a couple of colour note sketches….

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Some pattern sketches

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And more drawing development:

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And a couple of plates, cut and proofed once:

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Plate One and proofs.

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Plate Two

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Plate Two proof

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I cut a mask for the first plate, but unfortunately I can’t remember why…I guess it will come back to me or something else will suggest itself along the way.

The intention is to combine the plates with other images or just with each other and see what happens. “Play”, “Serendipity”  and “Chaos” are going to be my constant companions over the next couple of years… :)…It’s the endless possibilities that are so thrilling.. More exciting moth images to come.

March: in like an Adder’s head..out like a Peacock’s tail.

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The adders were my ongoing subject for Beautiful Beasts in March and this old weather proverb can go both ways, but we had a beautiful sunny weekend so maybe it is going out like a beautiful shimmering peacocks tail this year.
Chris and I had a walk around Woodwalton Fen yesterday which was fascinating. More of Woodwalton Fen to come, but in the early chilly morning it was beautiful. Birds, bees, a distant Marsh Harrier and the black water of the meres  reflecting a struggling sun. I thought about my adders again.

The large adder print …

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The block and some of the mess, the rest is scattered on the floor and around the house.

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2 colours..9.5 x12 inches

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3 colours… A proof print

In all I made 8 prints, each quite different, trying a variety of combinations as I cut away. They don’t call this reduction printing “suicide printing” for nothing! Once you have cut you can’t go back. I will post more stages on Print Daily soon. This is one I liked..

Fenland Adders: Keepers of Peaty Treasures.

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Four colour reduction print 9.5 x12 inches

What’s it about?
Well, in my personal, alternative reality, wild things generally have a better time than in real reality. It’s a grey breezy day with clouds bubbling up in a huge fenland sky.
My beautiful adders, keepers of the secrets buried in the peaty darkness of the fenland soils, rise up to survey their domain. One black and one patterned. They watch the distant peat cutters.
The sensible mouse keeps a safe distance. What are those things scattered in the soil? Who knows what lost treasures, bodies and bones are buried in the peat? It is a subject of enduring and delightful speculation.
It’s back to bees this week!.. then maybe eels 🙂

More about the Fossils..

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I have been lost in fossil land for the last few days and it is completely fascinating. I returned to the shoreline and have come back with some more treasures; some fragments of what I think might be Ammonites,  a few pieces of Belemnites, more Devil’s Toenails and some bits of what might be coral.

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I have one really beautiful section of a belemnite, see above, the large pointed piece, which I think is a Cylindrotheutis puzosiana. It is the fossilised internal end bit of one of these:

which was once one of these:

Both of these images come from this fascinating piece about Belemnites from Ferrebeekepeers

Like the Gryphaea, the Belemnite fossils were also thought to have various different origins and properties. The strange smooth shape gave rise to names such as Devil’s Fingers (more delightful devilishness), sword stones and gnomes candles but most wonderfully, they were thought to be thunderbolts, arriving after thunderstorms.
Both Gryphaea and Belemnites were thought to have healing properties, for joints and oddly for sore eyes… more folklore to come. The reason we have these fossils is because of the Oxford Clay which lies under the Boulder Clay.

Palaeontologist and Palaeoartist (very cool)  Mark Whitton has a couple of excellent blog posts about the Jurassic Oxford Clays here. This image from his blog shows the extent of these treasure filled clays.

The extent of the Oxford Clays.

Talking to local people there are fewer fossils here than there used to be as the banks have been shored up with boulders to stop the erosion, but there must still be quite a few and I have only cast a very untutored glance over the shoreline.  I am trying not to let this get obsessive but I can see how you might get the fossil hunting bug. On the creative front I did get some printing done. This is the result. You can see how I got there at Printdaily:

Gelatine and Lino Print Combo.

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Devil’s Toenail. 4 x4 inches.

A Lucky White Hart for 2014

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Here’s to a New Creative Year of prints, drawings, paintings, books, 3D and more.. Four particularly lovely things to look forward to:

  • This month I start contributing to Beautiful Beasts, an art blog shared with my friend Sue.
  • I will be developing ideas for the Dragon Puppet.
  • More printmaking will be happening over at PrintDaily
  • And I am getting ideas, research and sketches together for an Indian inspired piece.

Four particularly lovely things from the past few days:

  • Seeing the truly inspiring Shunga Exhibition at the British Museum (which is, without a doubt, my favourite place). Sex and superb printmaking is a heady mix.
  • Dining delightfully on delicious Dim Sum in Chinatown.
  • Watching Small Town Murder Songs with the extraordinarily sublime soundtrack from Bruce Peninsula.
  • Watching Lucinda Williams performing Joy from quite a few years ago..sheer Joy.

And as it’s a time for resolutions I have a few art related ones; to get back to sketching, to get out to more different locations to sketch, to get the oils out and, finally, this year, to get a long overdue website up. I did make a start today. It is going to be a busy year..

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White Hart: reduction lino print with gilded leaves.

see printdaily

A sighting of a White Hart was considered a good omen by some.

Let it be so!
A Happy New Year to All!

Pink Pig, Yellow Pig

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I have made a few lino print cards (strictly speaking “vinyl” prints) based on my Pig in Jacket sketch. Progress was slow and success rate rather low due to being a bit ambitious and trying a 3, 4 and 5 colour reduction print with a very small block. Each new colour printing is accompanied by yet another possibility for error. There were many. But I have about 20 cards. I recorded the process over at Printdaily. They are small. The image is 3 inches square.

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Four Colour reduction print Pink Pig. Image 3 inches square

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Three Colour Sunny Pig with three different plates.
The blue here is what was left of the reduction plate.

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A few cards almost ready to go..

A Slightly Improved Pig

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I am thinking that a-print-a-day on this blog might be very tedious for my kind readers and this blog tends to be a mishmash of many things so I have decided to corral all the print progress pics into a different blog.
I will put any new developments here too but I think 20 different versions of one print could be too much. It’s just interesting for me to chart the progress.
But if you would like to see what is happening go to PRINTDAILY. There is a link in the side bar too. This was a better print today using oil based inks for the final black.

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Enthusiastic Pig with Acorns… 8” x 6”

Printmaking: Starting properly… with some pigs.

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I am a very new printmaker. Yes I did a bit at college many years ago and some odds and ends since which I really enjoyed, but there is a lot to learn about paper, inks surfaces, tools and different combinations of all those things together.

My first attempts here have been mixed usually due to rushing things so I am going to try to get stuck in this winter and really learn.. from basics up.
My very good friend Den over at Animal Art Blog pointed me to a group who have been posting prints throughout October on Twitter see (#printoctober.) There is some great work there. It’s a bit late for me to contribute but, duly inspired, I have rashly decided to try to print something every day for a while and blog/tweet it. #printdaily

I had an interesting visit to the printmakers shop Intaglio on Saturday. I have to say that I feel very inadequate in these specialist shops. Other customers all seem supremely confident and knowledgeable, ask loudly for obscure things or are on first name terms with the staff.

I sometimes feel an imposter..but hey.. you have to start somewhere.
I came out with new inks and many unasked questions 🙂 Anyway continuing the the pig theme, I have been working on a small print with Chris’ Salute the Pig blog in mind and it may well fit into a new book/print project which is taking shape.
I’m not concerned about making the perfect print, it’s all about experiment at the moment and a chance  to try different papers and inks and combinations of plates. Some first prints..lots more to follow…

The prints are about 8”x 6” some hand printed, some put though the press, different papers etc etc .

Easton Show, A Sideways Step into Print and a Big Blue Bee

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I have said before, if the blog is quiet it’s because my life is not. How true. Just two weeks before our Easton Group Show and I am looking at the pile of “stuff”, sketches, prints, half started paintings. etc. What to do with all this?

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I have regarded this year as one of experimentation, I have researched, studied, thought and made many, many sketches and notes, more than I could ever put on the blog.
It’s been a year to meet other artists and share ideas and to explore some new directions.  It has been illuminating.

So for me the Easton Show will be a sort of marker, the end of one phase and the beginning of the next. With a very exciting solo show at Easton arranged for a years time, it’s on with forward planning and a few changes in what I do and how I work.

Letterpress, Print and Books

Number one on my list will be my delayed side step into printmaking.
I now have my lovely small Rollaco Press, my big old Cropper Charlton nipping press and a little old Adana housed in the garage and we are ready to go.

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Rollaco Press with bee

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The big old nipping press with my much prized Boxcar Press apron.

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Adana poised and ready….

I had been exploring letterpress again when I was in Orlando with the very excellent guys at Mamas Sauce whose enthusiasm and dedication to all things printy was so inspiring.

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Mamas Sauce Printshop in Orlando

Although we are not there anymore I still keep up with what they are doing. See their site for some wonderful printmaking, links and videos. There will be planned returns to St Brides in London where I printed “Rook” …

 

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St Brides Foundation London Print Museum and Courses.

And a hopeful trip to the USA to the fabulous Hamilton Wood Type and Printing Museum next year.

There will be making small books, inspirational prints and maybe a ranting broadside or two. So adventures with lino and the press started just this week with a very simple bee! (what else).
The huge new queen Bombus terrestris are out and about. They were my inspiration and  I may call her the “Easton Bee” in tribute!

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Many bees

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And in other colours too!

Big Blue Bee for Easton

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Image 6×4”reduction print on Hosho paper.

I really do intend ( Yes ..I do know all about hells road..but a girl has to try)  to get back to the blog with a perhaps a bit of a printy make over for that too.

I hope you will join me.

Week 10 notes. Grey days and a Colour filled Easton Workshop

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Last week was full with 3 days away, another great workshop with my group at Easton Walled Gardens and not very much drawing board time. The miserable weather and dark mornings made walks a bit more sporadic but I still managed a few, with related sketches. For the first few days of the week everything was grey and misty; land, water and sky merging into one. Trees, people and birds reduced to featureless darker shapes. Its quite beautiful really.

Monday: I walked up to the Visitor Centre to draw these trees. I will be teaching a “How to develop a sketch” workshop soon and this is a scene I have drawn and painted before.  It also means I can have a cup of tea while sketching!

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I wanted to look at outlines as well as tone.  The trees are losing their leaves fast now. A double spread with a thick pen.

Tuesday:  cold fishermen on a cold grey day

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Wednesday: I had to go St Neots way and have always liked the power Little Barford  power station towers. A quick sketch on another grey day with low clouds

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Thursday: A very hardy early fisherman on a very still grey misty morning. Even the ducks were motionless and looked glued to the water.

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Later …..Joe’s pumpkins

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Friday: Easton Workshop Day We had another great workshop all about recording material from the garden and colour. In preparation I had played around with some gelatine printing with leaves from the garden here. Many, many possibilities are revealed through playing and experimenting and allowing accidents to happen. Thanks to all for another inspirational day.

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Sunday: Little Paxton walk. A chilly walk mid morning and a sketch of part of the nicely woven fence..with a living willow post. It reminded me of my time in Costa Rica where branches of the accommodating gumbo limbo tree can just be stuck in the ground to form wonderful living fences.

There was a gumbo limbo tree at Leu.

See my post Gumbo Limbo and Peeling Tourists.

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My drawing of the gumbo limbo twiglet with leaves. Earlier this year I used a weigela pruning as a pea stick. It grew happily.. rather better than the peas in fact..

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The living willow post Paxton Pits. All sketches pen and ink in an A5 cartridge sketchbook. ( I have run out of spiral bound ones so used a gummed block. The pages are already falling out…v annoying!) >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

If you are wondering why I am numbering the weeks it’s because I am on countdown to a small operation which will have me on crutches for quite a while.

I am dreading the confinement but will hopefully be skipping, rather than hobbling, round the countryside again. Week 16 will be my last walking week.
Meanwhile I am out as much as possible!