More lakes - With Heron!

I have already done a picture of Llyn Idwal, the one with the curse that prevented any bird flying across its dark waters and the heron that was oblivious to that curse. However the previous image was a woodcut and I wanted to have another go at that scene with lino but not do a straight repeat. Luckily I had another view of Llyn Idwal from a slightly different angle as I followed the Heron across the lake in my sketches.

Again wasn't really sure where I was going with this so did a bit more colouring in of the tracing to get more of a feel for the contrast, chiaroscuro etc..

From this colouring I realised it was important to keep the depth of view between the foreground rock, lake, the moraine at the head of the lake, and looming above Tryfan. So the rock had to be pale and the mass of Tryfan quite dark but with some detailing. I really couldn't decide what colour to do the lake so left it blank to be 'filled in later'. But then sitting across the studio and staring at the drawing for a while (Important part of an artists practice, staring) it came to me that it needed to be very pale and flat. 

For this print I decided to experiment with a new set of inks I had bought as I was unable to get hold of a yellow in the inks I currently use. Problems at the manufacturing end apparently and as all these water soluble inks are not cross compatible I had to buy a complete new set in which included a yellow. I went for a Schmincke set of inks as the colours looked good and another very fine linocut artist I know call Robert Gilmor uses them, with stunning results.

Their consistency is much more liquid and thinner than my previous inks and it seemed harder to get a good graduated mix without it almost seeming too runny and the roller skidding over the ink. Once on the block that thinness meant the ink didn't seem to cover very well. Almost as if was drying as I applied it. The first print seemed okay until I tried to peel the paper of the block, where it felt as if the ink had dried as I was printing and the paper was almost stuck to the lino! It took very careful peeling to remove the paper without leaving half of it behind.

 Too much pressure? not enough ink? too much white ink? I kept going but had to re-mix more ink for each image, so seemed to be using a lot more than usual but then it looked as if there was not enough ink on the paper once I had printed. The colour, what there was of it, was really nice on the paper, it held a very accurate edge on even the finest cutting but just seemed too thin. Oh and of course nearly took the paper apart getting it off. Wrong paper?

Looks okay though. Some nice elements where the ink is so thin it shows the baren marks, which I always like. Bit dispirited by the whole thing really so I left it at that and went home...

Most excellent exhibition

I was lucky enough to have received an invitation to the Clive Hicks-Jenkins retrospective which opened at the National Library of Wales last Saturday, the 7th, and it was fantastic. Such a wide breadth of expressive, contemplative, beautiful paintings. They were introduced as if the gallery had become a church and indeed while being completely modern the paintings felt as if they belonged on a medieval alter.

Have a look at Clive's website and if you are within a 100 miles of Aberystwyth and the National Library and you get the chance do visit.

http://www.hicks-jenkins.com/

Back to the Llynoedd (Lakes)

 

I was very pleased with this sketch from the shore of Llyn Ogwen ( The image above is the A2 tracing done from the original drawing). It is my first A3 sized sketch rather than the more usual A4 and done with a drawing felt pen rather than my usual pencil. After drawing the scene in my normal A5 sketchbook it looked cramped and squished in. So I drew it again in my bigger sketchbook I had taken along for just such an eventuality. The landscape around the foothills of Snowdon being so expansive.

However once ready to print I realised that I didn't really know where I was going with it. Being determined to 'do something special' can be quite inhibiting. There was a vague feeling that I wanted to do something to follow on from and develop further the previous A4 two colour wave prints. But how?

To make matters worse I had decided to experiment with a completely new non Japanese paper. No pressure than. 

The paper is BFK Rives which is a lovely strong, bright white, four deckled edges paper but with a slightly rough surface. After printing the first print of the first colour I realised the surface was just a bit to rough to get a good smooth take up of ink printing by hand. So I turned it over and printed on the back. Has a slight laid pattern on the reverse which does add to the print.

It was only when I coloured in the tracing, and was quite strict in keeping to only two colours and black that I started to get somewhere. It also had to be quite bold colours, almost a pure yellow/ yellow ochre and a strong slate blue!

I also wanted to keep it as rough and loose as the original sketch with very strong cutting and patterns so kept more to the original drawing. Without the usual additional colours to help distinguish different areas in this print I decided to use more expressive cutting and really enjoyed getting a bit carried away. I also haven't used black for the final colour for a while now, finding it too heavy and dark against the lighter palette of colours I have been using. In this instance though it had to be black to get the most out of the contrast and the hopefully expressive cutting.

The paper worked very well and has taken the colour and the most delicate lines well. There is a slight misting or graininess to the black where it is not the completely saturated colour you expect. That may be down to the paper simply being a bit to thick to hand print, or to the plate getting a bit greasy while cutting because the intricacy of the drawing results in more chinagraph pencil being on the lino. As you cut the wax of the chinagraph line is rubbed across the plate creating a slight resist to the water based inks?

Very happy with the print and the overlay of colour, pattern and cutting. Just not sure how it fits in with the other prints. Next:

Ahoy. Ahah

I've always loved the tang of the sea air and fancied myself as a bit of a salty sea dog, without really going to sea that much. Though I have always enjoyed the little sailing I have managed. So when my dad invited me along on one of his sailing trips with the old boys I hesitantly jumped at the chance. A week cooped up in a tiny boat with my dad and two complete strangers in the midst of the Irish Sea with some of the most unpredictable weather in the world, what could go wrong?

Well surprisingly nothing really. Apart from a touch of going green for the first day, due to the weather being so rough, it was a good trip. We sailed from Whitehaven to Portpatrick and once I had my sea legs it was really enjoyable to sit on the pitching back deck, sketchbook clutched in hand drawing.  Trying to catch the coast sliding past at a rate of about 7 - 8 knots and the constant swell and shift of the waves passing underneath lifting then dropping the boat and roaring away towards the shore.  

Normally a 'Coastal' landscape involves a walk along the coast looking down or out to sea, seeing the front of a wave breaking and crashing landward. It was a novel and exciting challenge to be out at sea looking in to shore and watching the back of the wave moving away from me against the back drop of the land.

I think some of the sketches I produced over a couple of days rank up there with the best I have ever produced. In terms of their natural drama, composition and potential to be great prints. I'm really keen to continue the draw from the sea method, just perhaps not by sail. Sea Kayak maybe?

So when Aberystwyth Printmakers called for work for two new shows, both to consist of A4 sized prints there was only one set of sketches I reached for. One of the shows is at Aberystwyth Arts Centre opening the 8th of May, the other was at Wharapuke in New Zealand.

This print is of the Little Ross lighthouse, on the entrance to Kirkcudbright Bay, being left astern as we raced away.

Usually I enlarge my sketches from A4 up to A2 size but I finally thought I would have a go at doing the print the same size as the sketch. I only used a couple of colours and black and when I inked up purposefully kept the inking loose and quite random. Making sure not to cover the entire printing area. This keeps the print loose and spontaneous and is in keeping with the sketch and subject matter. It also adds a certain feeling of thinness and translucence which helps give the waves depth. With this print I also tried an all brown version.

This is Little Ross lighthouse earlier as we left Kirkcudbright Bay and turned to travel along the coast

Very happy with how these turned out at A4, so the next thing is to try them at the usual A2 size and perhaps even larger.

But first.....

Back to the lakes of Snowdonia and a different paper!

Torres Strait islander Alick Tipoti

Kid's in bed, cup of tea brewed, settled down to watch something on the iplayer and the Griff Rhys Jones new series 'Hidden Treasures of... Australian Art ' catches the eye. Always a sucker for the intensity and originality of spiritual art but wasn't sure if Griff was the man to deliver it.

So imagine my surprise when about 6 minutes in the first artist he visits in his search for the maker of a tribal mask is Alick Tipoti, a Torres Strait Islander now living in Cairns. Who while also carving masks usually works in .... fanfare.. Linocut. Huge bloody great things, in black and white, dense with fascinating pattern and incredibly rich in meaning and belief.

Here is an explanation of his work;

"Alick Tipoti is a Torres Strait Islander who is guided by the traditional cultural practices of his people. He believes in the Zugubal who were spoken about for many years by his ancestors. He is most diligent about what he sees as his responsibility to document the stories, genealogies, songs and other aspects of his culture so that it is available for future generations to learn, understand and practice. He speaks his native language, Kala Lagaw Ya of the Maluilgal nation of Zenadh Kes. Alick believes that language is the vital ingredient that binds all cultures in the world today. ‘Without your language you become a foreigner, lost in another persons culture. * The Australian Art Print Network "

'Koedalal ar Sapural'

Kuyku Garpathamai Mabaig 2007
linocut on paper, edition 3/45

And just to give you an indication of the size and impact of the prints heres the man himself with his wonderful pictures.

 A great deal of his philosophy regarding the place of language in defining and grounding a culture has many parallels with the place and importance of the Welsh language in shaping the resurgence of the welsh culture and nation today. There is also a very interesting piece in the programme where he talks of the spirits of his ancestors helping him with the print, although not as strongly in Cairns as they do back home. To help them with this he usually prints at night. A lot of artist talk of the Muse but his is much more personal and effective it seems. I was fascinated to see how his immersion, his belief in his traditional belief system gives him an unshakable confidence and self belief in his own work and his place, both historical and cultural, in producing that artwork. Which gives his artwork not only a vast wealth of subject to draw upon but a passion and integrity in the execution of that subject, that has such meaning for him, and which then goes a long way towards giving the work it's power.

If as a modern western artist you have no religion, no organised beliefs, where does that passion, that belief in the point and meaning of your own work come from. Do you need it at all? Or do you have to scrabble around and find something else to believe in, spiritual or not to replace the lack of a coherent system in which you have a place. Can you create your own things to believe in and find important enough to give your work  a sense of depth and veracity? Or can you ( can I ) draw on the religious, historical and cultural baggage into which I was born without the belief in that baggage.

Really loved the idea, especially after the shots of the Torres Islands Landscape, of an Artist as different from me as can be in terms of location, climate, culture, language, geography and especially belief, but still using lino, a language we could both speak.

Will have a big think on this and see where it takes me. Back to St George and the Dragon I think.

Number two, The Misty Mountain (Not Tolkien!)

The second smaller illustration for the i-ching was to be a mountain path ascending up through the mists. As luck would have it I found a great sketch I had done, but not yet used, of Tryfan. A great grey shattered peak of a mountain in North Wales. It rears like a broaching whale above Llyn Ogwen and I had sketched it from below the main road and included the bridge so with a bit of judicious photoshoppery majigerry, Tryfan was stretched up to mountain of heaven proportions, I then redrew the bridge to make it a bit more 'Chinese' and put a winding path in and then 'bigged'up the river that runs under the bridge. The actual river Ogwen is concealed by the cut it runs in but I wanted a rushing mountain stream so lifted it right up and made it foam and splash. It was also a good way to take the eye into the composition and accentuate the path/steps by separating them out from the main body of the picture.

Initially the path started with steps just in the immediate foreground with the idea that you went out of the picture and back in again at the bridge to suggest the winding nature of the path.  The client then decided they wanted it a bit more obvious that the steps in the foreground connected directly to the bridge and up the mountain.
Rough 2:

 Steps wind up to the bridge and the cliff on the edge has gone. This does have the added bonus of making the main mountain seem higher. Mmmm steps a bit too erm steppy and maybe too easy! How about more of a rough path to suggest the hard and worthy work involved. Mmmm what about that bridge? Too bridgey maybe? Maybe it should be more of a rough mountain track all au natural. yes lose the bridge!
Rough 3:

Path rough and stoney, bridge, one of my favourite bits, transformed cunningly into a natural arch and the difficult path switch backing up the mountain accentuated. That's it, perfect!
Artwork:

This was a two colour print, with a graduation in the layers to add more variety and depth.  I do like the background mountains emerging from the mist in a paler colour. Was a nice chance to experiment with rubbing out part of the ink to knock that part of the print back and also try the cutting of the mountain sides in lines to suggest the form. Overall a happy client.

Intermission - A little illustration job

My agent in London NB illustration passed on a nice little illustration job to me recently doing a pitch for a book publisher to take to the Frankfurt Book Fair. The book is a new fully illustrated edition of the I-Ching for which I was asked to do two sample illustrations for page mock ups.  The first half page full colour picture is of a chinese junk, the second a typical misty Chinese mountain with ascending path.

The first sketch I sent (Above) had all the elements , but not enough vavavoom. Not oriental enough, so I spiced it up with more than a hint of eastern promise, sent it off and it was a hit. (Below)

 

The Junk needed a bit of work as it currently looks like a bathtub, which I corrected for in the print sketch. 

Final print. As you can no doubt see the main inspiration for the waves was good 'ole Hokusai's 'Great Wave' and other wave images from his 100 views of Mount Fuji. Although I put a lot of effort into the various sections and shades of blue in the foreground waves. Really wanted to get a sense of depth and distance in, with the feel that the sea was choppy all the way to the horizon. Really pleased with the way it turned out, more so now that I can see it fresh, not having looked at it for a couple of months.

Next post: The misty mountain...