Printing Small!

(To read full post you may need to click blog title to view in your browser.)

One of the joys of printing with Akua ink is their property of drying by absorption (rather than evaporation). This means as long as the ink is sitting on a non-porous surface (like glass, plexi-glass or even a plastic sheet) it remains open and will not dry. This gives you unlimited time to play around, daydream, experiment -- even walk away for an hour or a day.

Acrylic paint is the polar opposite. To someone used to working slowly and methodically, that stuff dries in a blink of an eye! But the push to work fast can be energizing. And because each layer dries quickly, you can produce a batch of finished prints in an afternoon. Sometimes, with the Akua inks, a week or two will pass before I can add the next layer.

A few weeks ago, I dug out a gel printing plate and junk mail booklets that were printed on quality paper with a nice matte finish. I don't often use acrylic paint and only had a small range of colours to work with. This is how things started out:

The face print was a happy accident. I pulled a print and the photograph on the page transferred to the gel plate and I was able to pick up that image onto another page and then keep working around the image. Just a note -- the print is for my own enjoyment and experimentation. Likely the photo is a copyrighted image and therefore not legal to be used for art that will be sold. 

I kept working on full pages and got images like the one below (the paint obscures the original image yet the underlying colour, values and shapes add depth and mystery to the print):

Couldn't bring myself to chop this one up but most of the printed pages got cut down to 9x9-cm squares. Some I used to make a concertina book. 

Here is another concertina:

I also mounted the small square prints on 5x7-inch cards. I had seen an artist's work presented that way on Pinterest and liked how it looked. But somehow my prints seemed unanchored in a vast sea of white. 

Eventually I tried adding a coordinating strip underneath and suddenly the compositions started to work.

Some of the prints were overprinted with hand-carved stamps.

This is one of my favorites.

I like how the pattern in the strip echoes the main print and how that bit of dark shadow anchors the tree. Here are two more of the 5x7-inch cards:

Below is one that I liked but it seemed unfinished. Then I added the collaged bird. And that opened up a whole other avenue. Here it is matted:

The prints below could also benefit from an additional layer and a bit of collage might do the trick.

Now I'm happily heading down that rabbit hole and will report in soon with what happens next!

What Have I Been Up To?

  (To read full post you may need to click blog title to view in your browser.)

It's been fairly productive in the studio the past few months. Here's a roundup of some of the projects.

Like many of us socially isolating during the pandemic, I amassed an embarrassing large stash of brown paper bags from too much take-out! Nothing to do but chop them up and stitch a lovely stash of blank booklets.

These booklets are fun to work into and, except for a little time, cost nothing so it's easy to experiment and, as interest wanes, simply start a new booklet.

One thing I did find, though, was that many of the bags seem to have been treated with a type of waterproofing, which created a resist with some art products. Below, you can see the effect of the resist. I quite enjoyed its splotchy and unpredictable nature.

I took a few free online workshops, including one offered by Winslow Art Center in Washington state with art teacher Amis Balcomb (she doesn't seem to have a website). 

 https://winslowartcenter.com/past-free-classes/amis-balcomb-the-embellished-simple-sketch/ 

I'd taken another of her classes and she is big on using water-soluble crayons and pens to elevate simple landscape sketches.

These chunky Lyra brand graphite crayons are great. As well, the ink in many office supply fineliner pens is water soluble. Who knew?

Here're a few with added colour -- ochre acrylic ink.

A stack of postcard blanks at the ready is handy for a bit of quick gel plate printing, like these moody landscapes:

I also got back into the habit of a daily (almost) sketch. The first one below is a tissue paper monotype collage with a bit of rubbing. I love adding text to a sketch.

The two below are examples of some larger sketches (11x15-inches) using an idea from  the YouTube channel Yeates Makes where you first create a random background and then sketch on top. Somehow that technique is very freeing!

I'd also been casting about for a textile craft I could do in the evening while watching TV. Wasn't keen on crocheting or knitting. Cross stitch was out. For a while, I hand-stitched small fabric collages (about 6x6-inches), like below.

But they required a certain amount of pre-planning. I wondered if weaving might be the ticket... Got a stack of books (love, love public libraries), showed my ever-accommodating husband (who, from now on, shall affectionately be known as EAH!) a photo of a simple frame loom. Soon after he returned from his workshop with this beauty:

The book is Weaving by Mary Maddocks. Here's the first little sample (made with $4 worth of thrift store yarn).

Enjoying the meditative quality of over and under -- simple weaving is proving to be the perfect evening companion. Along with EAH!

I also got back into a good routine in the studio and have been warming up with some 9x9-cm prints, which I'll show you in the next post. Meanwhile, all best to everyone!