Silent Sunday …
Weekly Photo Challenge … Now
Now, is nothing new for me and Weekly Photo Challenge, my images inspired by the prompt are usually of the moment. I have little time to browse previous data or think too deeply about something photographically correct … when there is only now.
So, what of now? It is between Christmas and the New Year an awkward void that remains so ‘unplanned’ for, a time when we forget the day of the week.
I am of a generation who remembers, when those employed returned to work the day after Boxing Day and New Year’s day was not a Bank holiday.
I don’t remember when this elongated holiday became the norm and still find it clumsy and almost uninvited!
However, it has become a time for me to take stock and begin again and time to celebrate …
Happy New Year!
New Years resolution …
Since returning from Brazil and my teacher moving away, my creativity has become muddled. While I have carried on much as usual, but without a regular ‘catch up’ with my teacher, I have lost my focus. Although I remain a print maker, I have lost direction. I have attended workshops and classes each offering opportunities to learn something new and add to my overall experience, none really fitted the bill. Yes, I did learn something new and was often successful. However, with new materials and tools I was distracted from my favoured discipline; linocut.
I have not stopped linocutting, infact even without a teacher I developed a style I like and wish to perfect, sadly with no one to discuss my difficulties.
I enjoy reduction printing, the dangerous element is exciting and I have developed a way to merely draw on the lino with brush and permanent ink ; a fluid line already spontaneous and loose, Then, I begin inking and cutting more and more until I am left with the original single line I began with.
The ink is rolled on almost painterly so I am left with a lovely layered painted effect.
However, for a printmaker, this method is flawed and is destined to appear to less than linocut.
There should be no doubt it is linocut it should bear all the hallmarks of a relief print; those we pride ourselves on.
So, my new year’s resolution is to perfect my style, registration, clarity, colour theory etc.
So my first question: How do I achieve shades like pale sky blue, rock rose pink or dove grey, without adding white that I find too opaque and unforgiving. I prefer to layer subtle colours to create shape, and depth, but the colours created with the primary colours are harsh and blemished.
I will value any suggestions to practice of the next few weeks.
Silent Sunday
Happy Holidays ….
“May your blocks be flat.
your gravers sharp,
your inks smooth
your fingers clean,
and your prints as crisp as you desire … ‘
this prayer was bestowed on Linocut friends by Doug Haug, this morning with season’s greetings. I heartily agree and return the good wishes.
Along with every teacher I have encountered this year; this is indeed the mantra that we should breath before and during our work.
…. So what of the results no matter how we adhere to the rules there are failures and like our ugly child or scruffy dog, they have endearing features.
Like this one just failed from day one; but it remains a joy.
Happy Holidays
Silent Sunday
Yesterday …
Yesterday; I attended a screen printing workshop in London at the Print Club London. No great shakes, I have been to a few workshops over the last couple of years. However, this one was special as I had booked it originally in September for November, before I was brought down by a horrible back injury and then postponed it. It was some time before I considered that I was well enough; not just to undertake the long journey but to stand for several hours in a print room.
So yesterday it happened! The journey was without difficulty to a part of London I had visited earlier in the year; Dalston. Arriving early I was able to have a reconnoitre of the local shops that I noted before.
The course was Photo-emulsion Screen Printing for beginners it was really good I learned a lot and we all produced 6 perfect images to take home. Although, I have tried screen printing before my experience was mostly hands-on using paper stencils. This was more technical using Paint Shop and then chemicals and equipment that I would not have at home.
The idea was that having learned the skills we could come back to the Print Room to use the equipment, practice and develop our new found skills. Sadly, I live too far away to make it practical however I do plan to do deluxe today course and during that time find a print room nearer home that offer similar facilities .
However I am not sure any print room will offer such a wide array of independant shops and cafes I enjoyed at lunchtime.
So I look forward to returning in the new year for a longer session.
Weekly photo challenge … Oops.
I am a printmaker; coming into the creative world late in life. It has been a riotous journey, in the good way, although in the depths of disadvantage I have felt less than joyous. I have begun exhibiting work and even have sold some pieces. This has been the icing on the cake; however my most popular linocut has been the the result of several mistakes and tears.
Reduction print is a way of printing a linocut and often referred to is being the suicide print. It bears this namely rightly because as the print developes so the block becomes more more cut away; it is organic, dynamic and unforgiving … there is no going back.
so this ‘oops’ has given me a tears, a story and a little financial return.
A ‘failed’ reduction print
Its Monday …
Last week I promised myself time to make a painting, print or draw a day … not such a arduous task as I do some art work each day. However I am incline to put ‘them’ aside because they are unfinished or less than a work of art! So I am trying to celebrate and enjoy myself. These few pages are nice.
Silent Sunday
Coat Hanger Doll's House 