FINALLY… I’VE BUSTED OUT OF MY CREATIVE BLOCK and have made some Cyanotype wall hangings. Cyanotype printing is a non-toxic process that was developed in 1842. Early botanists used the process to capture minute details of plants. The resulting image is a stable Prussian Blue print.
The cyanotype process is a way of portraying the subject using a light sensitive emulsion and developing the image by the light of the Sun. The prints are sometimes referred to as sun prints or photograms. It is a process that requires patience as the Tasmanian sun does not always perform on cue !
Here are a few pics of my cyanotype work that I have just put into our Bruny Island “Imprint of Bruny” art exhibition. The embossed wall hangings are titled “Imprint of Bruny” – Beach walk, Paddock, Garden & Oyster Catcher. They are the result of my Bruny walks on Hansson’s beach & Highwood’s paddocks and garden. They derive from found objects and plant specimens, handmade papercuts & photographs from my walks.
To prevent cyanotypes from fading they should be kept out of direct sunlight. If they do happen to fade over time, you just pop them into a dark cupboard for a while and, magically, the colour revitalises !
I have slowly been setting up my new studio space since the move & struggling with feeling comfortable and creative in the new space. The space is small, it’s a wierd “L” shape, it doesn’t have much natural light, or view or ventilation !! But…. I try to make the most of it, remain positive about it and try to love it ‘warts n’ all’ & make the space work for me. On the upside – it is solely my space, it has lots of nice shelving and I have good immediate access to undercover outside space with running water ! I’m still setting up but it’s at a workable stage now and I’ve started printmaking again. I’ve also been lucky enough to borrow a piece of very important equipment for a printmaker – A fabulous sturdy old brownbuilt paper drawer ! Hooray – no more rolling up my precious paper. This will make such a difference to me and will make life on the ‘paper front’ so much easier. Thanks April ! The space is coming together but I do miss my old Green Room.
Recently, 79 Australian chemistry professionals & 38 Tasmanian printmakers collaborated to create the periodic table of elements for the Royal Australian Chemical Institute. I was one of the artists invloved. My three allotted elements for the project were Selenium, Chromium and Indium. I created 2 plate intaglio collograph prints for each of the elements. My process began by taking photographs of the subject matter or creating a drawing and making papercuts from the photos or drawings. I collaged the papercuts directly to a cardboard matrix and add detail with a drypoint tool and stanley knife. My collages are then covered with shellac and hand printed in the usual intaglio manner by using an etching press.
Selenium (Se34): I investigated the area of food science to formulate my image for Selenium. Selenium plays a key role in the functioning of the human immune system and thyroid gland. The trace element is also needed for successful reproduction. We have naturally occurring selenium in our bodies and it is also available in a number of foods. A selenium rich source of food is the Brazil nut. I have portrayed this orbicular hard shelled fruit containing the triangular, wrinkled seeds known as Brazil nuts.
Indium (In 49): The bottles in this print represent Indium supplements which are available in liquid or tablet form for human consumption. There is great debate regarding Indium and human health. In some circles it is hailed as a miracle dietary supplement with multiple claims of beneficial therapeutic results. Scientific literature, however, does not support these testimonials.
Chromium (Cr 24): I have depicted an audio cassette tape for the Chromium element. Chromium dioxide or chromium(IV) oxide is a synthetic magnetic substance used in the manufacture of magnetic tape emulsion. Chrome tape is considered by many to be the most perfect magnetic recording tape available. This is due to the way in which the chromium dioxide crystals can be evenly and densely dispersed in the magnetic coating which leads to unparalleled low noise performance in audio cassette tapes.
(See my previous post “expressing chemistry through art” for a bit more info regarding this printmaking project. The complete periodic table of elements can be viewed on the RACI website. Follow these links – http://www.raci.org.au/raci-news/periodic-table-on-show-launch & http://www.raci.org.au/periodic-table-on-show)
For a long time I’ve been thinking about capturing the beautiful moments in my failed prints and turning them into jewellery. At a workshop last weekend with Shauna Mayben I learned how seal my printed papers into perspex, transforming them into brooches and pendants. It’s always so exciting to breathe new life into something that would otherwise never see the light of day !
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During this hectic and unsettling time as we move house, I’ve managed to squeeze in a printmaking workshop to soothe my soul. Last weekend was spent “off Island” in Hobart participating in a white ground etching workshop with Iona Johnson at Hunter Island Press. A fabulous workshop and steep learning curve as always gleaned from teachings by Iona. White ground etching (soap ground etching) is a technique that can be use to create organic printed marks of varying tonal depth. I have been trying to “loosen up” and become more painterly with my mark making and introduce tone to my work so I think that this will be a method that I will experiment with and use frequently in my printmaking. I can imagine my usual prescise line drawings against energetic, spontaneous, organic, tonal backgrounds. I am also drawn to this method as it is less toxic than traditional etching using nitric acid. We used copper plates as our substrates and white ground as the resist. We also aquatinted our plates with spray paint and etched them with Edinburgh Etch which is a ferric chloride & citric acid solution. The white ground resist is a combination of soap flakes, linseed oil, titinium white pigment and water. The white ground breaks down during the etching process and creates irregular tones. What a fascinating process with so many possible outcomes and huge scope for experimentation. Thanks to Iona, Steph and John for another great HIP workshop.
An interesting Web Link: Article on White ground etching by Frank Cassara
(If you move you cursor over my photos, there is a brief description of each & you can click on them for a larger view)
Bye Bye Green Room !! (Not my blog – just my precious little studio space). I have had to move house and so leave my little studio. The Green Room has been such a great creative space for me and I’m going to miss it dearly. I have a new space that I can set up again at our new place but it is far from ideal for a printmaking studio ie: only one window (with a pretty lousy outlook straight into the carport and Bori’s Shed !) poor natural light and not great ventilation. I am, of course, extremely grateful to have a new space to set up as my studio and I’m sure I’ll cope with it’s undesirable qualities and transform it into a fantanstic new studio space.
I am going to miss the Green Room and I’m heading over there today to pack up the final few boxes. One of the positives is that it’s been a good opportunity to sort through the oodles of stuff that I’ve managed to squeeze into the small space of the Green Room. I’ll continue this blog as Jo’s Green Room from the walls of the new “L shaped, white room”. I am anxious to get it set up as soon as possible and get on with some white ground etching.
I’ve had an insanely mad and productive, labour intensive month or so creating 25 lino blocks for my ‘Bruny Alphabet’ series. It has been in my head for a while and it’s great to see it finally manifest. Every spare minute of my time I’ve been carving my lino blocks and proofing. Many late nights and my 25 lino blocks are finished, printed and my Bruny Alphabet is ready for framing.
How lucky I am to call Bruny Island “home”. It is such a privilege to be surrounded by the astonishing natural beauty of Bruny land and seascapes. My Bruny Alphabet- a series of 25 lino prints is a celebration of the diverse and magnificent flora, fauna and marine life that also inhabit this little island at the bottom of the world.
A – Abalone, B – Brown tree frog, C – Chiton, D – Dragonfly, E – Echidna, F – Forty Spotted Pardalote, G – Geese (the two white geese on the way to the ferry! ), H – Hobart Brown Butterfly, I – Isoodon Obesulus (Southern Brown Bandcoot), J – Jack Jumper, K- Kelp gulls, L – Lissotes Menaclas (Mount Mangana Stag Beetle), M – Masked Owl, N – Nodding Greenhood Orchid, O – Oyster Catcher, P – Possum, Q – Quoll, R - Rabbit, S – Swift Parrot, T – Tasmanian Waratah, U – Urchin, V- Velvet Seastar, W – White Wallaby, X – Xanthorrehoea australis (grasstree), Y – Yellow sundial shell, Z – Zoothera Lunalata (Bassian Thrush)
Each lino print is 15cm x 15cm, printed in rich black lithographic ink (ie: black with lots of blue mixed in to soften it) and printed with my etching press onto Canson Edition 250gsm, Antique white paper.
(You can click on the images below and view them in a larger format.)
On the weekend I ventured over the mountain to Keith Smith’s fabulous Rock & Sky studio/gallery space set in his tranquil garden at Lunnawanna on Bruny island. Sun ju Han (a visiting artist from Korea) had a fabulous exhibition “Island Story” featuring her exquisite hand made paper bowls. In conjunction with this she generously shared her Joomchi skills with some eager Bruny Islanders.
Joomchi is a new word and paper process for me. It is a Korean form of felting hanji paper. The term joomchi is derived from the Korean expression “making a journey.” You use thin rice paper and water to produce durable textured and collaged or layered sheets. The process is simple but requires patience and practice to develop a rhythm and style. I managed to make 3 small sheets of paper during the afternoon. It takes time to work the paper sheet rhythmically between your hands, continuously agitating it so that the paper fibres meld and become one. You end up with a very strong, crinckly and beautifully textured sheet of paper that contains tiny pinholes which are characteristic of joomchi. I am very keen to try this process again and use some natural plant dyes or the cyanotype process to dye the paper. It was a fabulous afternoon of learning in a wonderful setting. Thankyou Sun ju, Keith and Hana.
Clutter has slowly been creeping into the Green Room so I’ve just had a major clean up and throw out. Lurking underneath piles of ‘stuff’ were these few random little test prints that I unearthed ! Amongst them some hand coloured polystyrene prints, etched lino, 2 plate collograph plates using stencils and drypoint collographs. They’re not great, but a test plate (a first) always has a certain raw charm and it’s good to keep these proofs as a record of my learning curve as I experiment with new techniques and mediums. I went through a monocolour, one layer phase and most of these prints reflect that. Slowly I am beginning to embrace multi-layers and more colours !! I thought I’d share this little handful of test prints with you
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The United Nations has declared 2011, the International year of Chemistry, as a worldwide celebration of the achievements of chemistry and its contributions to the well bieng of humankind. To mark and celebrate this I am involved with a printmaking project that has been sponsored by the RACI (Royal Australian Chemical Institute). The periodic table of elements is the most fundamental rescource used by chemists. It provides a useful framework to classify, systematize and compare all of the many different forms of chemical behaviour. The project involves 37 Tasmanian printmakers. We have been randomly allotted 3 of the 112 elements from the periodic table to portray by means of traditional 15 x 15 cm print. An edition of 15 bleed prints has to be produced for each element.
At the end of the project all 112 prints will form the full periodic table and will be on permanent display at the RACI head office in Melbourne and New Zealand whilst the other editions may tour nationally. A poster will also be created to be distributed to Australian schools. It’s exciting to be involved with this educational project.
My elements are Selenium (Se 34), Indium (In 49) and Chromium (Cr 24). Over the last few weeks, I have been busy researching my elements, designing my images, creating the plates and proofing. Expressing chemistry through art has been quite a challenge. I have chosen to make 2 plate drypoint collographs for all three elements. Stay tuned for web links to this project. Snippets of detailsof work in progress follow……….
13th August 2011…… Update………The periodic table has been launched and is about to go on tour. Check out http://www.raci.org.au/raci-news/periodic-table-on-show-launch & http://www.raci.org.au/periodic-table-on-show)
My gorgeous dog Cedar died of old age at Christmas time. He was with me for 13 years and was a constant and delightful friend. I have lost my faithfull little companion and life seems bleak without him. To help me get through my feelings of loss and grief, I have been creating some prints of Cedar. I’ve christened my new press printing this series of three prints and she works like a dream. I’m attempting to create some intaglio monoprints of Cedar using some of the methods that Ron Pokrasso employs in his work – stay tuned for those as I’m still creating the plates. In the meantime these 3 proofs are the first little series of “Cedar”. I’m trying to move away from single layer/mono-colour prints and utilise multi plates and more colour in my images to create more visual interest and complexity. These prints are 2 plate drypoint collographs. During Cedar’s last week of life, I took lots of photos of him. To create these prints I used some of my photos to make paper cuts of Cedar. These I collaged and used a drypoint tool to add more detail. I achieved the background texture with acrylic medium on a separate plate and I used paper stencils when printing the two plates together with the usual intaglio inking and wiping. I think that the printing method I used is referred to as “pochoir” which is a french term for Stencil technique. Or maybe pochoir only refers to hand colouring using stencils?? I need to research this. Anyway here’s my Cedar boy…….
My Press has finally arrived from Melbourne Etching Supplies. I could hardly contain my excitement as Boris pulled into the driveway yesterday with my press on the back of the Ute. I feel so thrilled to have a press here on Bruny. It is amazing to have such a beautiful press just a couple of steps away in my studio instead of having to travel up to town for a print session. Thanks to Boris and T-bone it didn’t take long to unpack, carry down (all 170 kgs), assemble and level. Thanks guys.
I’ve lightly oiled the bed and rollers (I live right beside the sea and I’m so worried about rust !!), I’ve trimmed the blankets down to size and I’m ready to print. My dear old dog, Cedar, died a week before Christmas – so it seems only fitting that the first print I do on my new press is one of him. I’m off to the studio to play with my new toy !!
I’ve finished my Diploma couse !! It feels so good to see something through to the end. The last 3 weeks of the course have included a wood cut workshop with Tasmanian printmaker Michael Schlitz . He’s a great teacher and I was so grateful that he spent time showing us how to sharpen our hand tools. Michael says practice, practice, practice & I definately need to – it’s difficult to get the correct angle happening. I splashed out and bought myself a nice little sharpening stone and a couple of new hand tools. Michael encouraged us to work on a fairly large scale - 900mm x 600mm. I was a bit nervous about scaling up at first but found it to be incredibly liberating once I started cutting. We hand printed with barrens and spoons on to Japanese Kozo paper and I was surprised at how simple and quick it was to take a print without the use of a press. To date this is the largest print I have made. This is the second proof of “Shy Albatross and chick”…..it needs a little more cutting and refining but for my first wood cut I am pretty pleased with the result.
Looming Entaglement II - Steel plate Etching / aquatint – edition of 20
Commercial fishing practices are a constant threat to sea birds. Globally, thousands of seabirds are killed in each year when they become hooked or become entangled in commercial fishing nets. My first etching with aquatint “Looming entanglement II” speaks of this threat to our seabirds.
I’m still trying to get my head around aquatint and the fact that you are adding the light to create tonal values – working in reverse again as in many printmaking processes. This is definately a technique that I want to explore further and after bin diving last week to “rescue” some steel plate – I am excited about creating more etchings using the aquatint method on my newly acquired plates !
I exhibited my papercut/letterpress work 50 words for 50 Birds in the Bruny Island Bird Festival last weekend. Fab photographer Warwick Berry kindly took a couple of photos of my works for me with his super duper camera and super duper skills. Thanks Warwick. Here is the finished framed piece.
I have finally done my first etching !! Steel plate etched in Nitric. Just 3 small test plates – hard ground, soft ground and one experimental plate. I have a new teacher at college – Blair Waterfield. He is incredibly passionate about printmaking & he really gets the class moving and thinking conceptually. Although our first 3 little plates were just test plates I treated them like they were going to be a framed piece of work. Sometimes I figure that even though they are merely test plates I want to try to make something worthy – and because they were my first etchings, it kind of felt special. I am working with the theme of the danger of entanglement that our seabirds face – entanglement in discarded fishing nets (ghost nets) and discarded fishing line from both recreational and commercial fishing practices. A shocking and depressing reality. During my research I came across many global sites and community groups that are a voice for our seabirds and marine creatures. The images on these sites of entangled birds are incredibly disturbing and I can’t shake these distressing images from my mind.
Each time I printed the plates, my aim was to try and print each time in a different way from the previous print. I made the use of stencils (positive and negative) different layers, different wiping techniques and different colours to achieve 30 varying prints. It was refreshing to work with blue and green ink to reflect the colours of the sea. I have mostly been working with rust and earthy colours for a while so the blues and greens were like a breath of fresh air. I knew I was going to cut the little prints out (bleed prints) so I didn’t have any worries about registration. This felt liberating and I found that my energy was directed towards experimenting and creative processes rather than bieng caught up and slowed down with precise registration. The resulting work is a collage of about 30 prints that I have had framed and will put into the Bruny Island Bird Festival Art Exhibition.
I managed to squeeze in some letterpress at college last week to finish off my “50 Words for 50 Birds” piece for the Bruny Island Bird Festival. Gillbert is our techy at college and he is incredibly knowlegeable and helpful when it comes to all things print making. I haven’t done much letter press before and it took a couple of hours to set this little bit of text. Each letter has to be set individually. It’s astounding to think that all our newpapers were once printed in this way. It’s difficult to read upside down and back to front but you get the hang of it after a while and with the help of sense of touch (there’s little grooves on the front of each letter) I found my hands and brain moving a little quicker by the time the text was set.
With Gil’s help, I printed my text on this lovely old Vandercook proofing press.
I’ve bee working on some black and white collages for the Bruny Island Bird Festival Art Exhibition which is coming up at the end of October. It’s great to be making use of all my failed prints and there’s something very satisfying about tearing them into tiny pieces, re-inventing and transforming them into something new and entirely different. I keep returning to imagery of ”Wren on the Rocks” and the collage of the flying parrot is about the risk of window collision for birds. Off to the Green Room to work on some more……….
Look what arrived in the post yesterday….
One of the brand, spanking new Ink Rollers that I have purchased from Melbourne Etching Supplies . No more struggling with 2nd rate tools. I’ll be inking up in style now !!
I’ve been thinking about the plight of the orange bellied parrot and the sad fact that there are only 50 birds left in the wild. I’ve been thinking about the fact that extinction is forever. I’ve been thinking about what it means to be “critically endangered”. I’m using my ”failed prints” to make 50 paper cuts of the Orange Bellied Parrot to highlight the plight of this little guy.
I went to a “de-construction” workshop at Hunter Island Press on the weekend hosted by the wonderful, intuitive and enthusiastic Kaye Green. The workshop was part of the PCA’s print forum. Kaye helped me to focus on my OBP papecut project and put my other ideas on the back burner for a while. Sometimes I have so many ideas rattling around my brain and I try to manifest them all at once instead of just concentrating on one thing at a time ! I’m learning that this is my way and I’m trying to reign myself in and focus on one project at a time instead of bieng so scattered with my work. I see many unfinished projects and works in progress ’round my studio as evidence of this trait !!! I may put some text with this papercut work …words that have been flying round my head like - miracle, flight, wings, orange bellied, feathered friend, looming extinction, critically endangered, threatened, salt marsh habitat, breeding, wild, population, migration, rehabilitation, recovery…………………….
I love the shadows created by my papercuts. They add depth and a three dimensionality.
After my little oily experiment last week and playing with shadows & the light box, I remembered some photos that I took some years ago. I have searched the lower belly regions of my computer and dug them out. With this set of photos I played with the idea of casting patterns with the shadows and light and after playing with similar ideas last week I have obviously still got the same ideas rumbling around in my head somewhere. I’m not sure where I’m going with this but I see great potential to use these shadow and light photos in combination with traditional methods. I haven’t digitally manipulated these photos. I am interested in using my photos in the raw state that they were taken and not manipulating them. I imagine them as layers behind intaglio prints. I have been reluctant to tread the tradigital path but how will I know how I really feel about digital if I don’t give it a go !? I feel a basic photoshop course coming on !
Jo, February 2011
