A one-off print for a very special little girl’s third birthday. She is already skating and loves being on the ice. The colour has been chosen specifically as it has a link to her name – other colours are available!
Skater Girl
Tag: artist
Castlerigg Stone Circle
I’ve been wanting to make a print of this for some time now. It is taken from an original photograph of mine, which was taken early one morning at the site, high up on the hills near Keswick in the Lake District. It is a very beautiful place and can often be quite busy, but get there early and you can have the place all to yourself, as we did on this occasion. I tried to keep the print simple, focusing on the actual stones rather than the surrounding hills. The colours are nothing like representative of what is there, but I’m pretty happy with the result.
Busy, Busy, Busy
I have been neglecting my blogging duties lately, mainly because I have been desperately trying to get various ideas out of my head and onto paper! The first two images shown were inspired by a visit to St Peter’s Church in Conisbrough; one of the oldest buildings in South Yorkshire. This visit had been inspired by reading the book “South Yorkshire Folk Tales” which mentions what is thought to be either a Viking or Saxon tomb cover that can be seen inside the church. The stone is carved with what appears to be a figure, possibly St George, defending a cowering Bishop from a dragon. I took the theme and researched examples of knights, bishops and dragons depicted in Medieval art to make a composite image. The smaller “face” print is a two dimensional representation of a carving to be found on one end of the same tomb cover.
We spent some of the Summer holidays in Northumberland and on the East coast of Yorkshire. I took photographs of images I already had prepared in my head (from previous visits to these places) to produce the prints of Lindisfarne Castle and a couple of small fishing boats in the harbour at Staithes near Whitby. I also have a couple more prints ready to go when I get a lull (haha!) You see, I can’t even switch my mind off when I go on holiday! I am currently working on three images, one at the carving stage, one at the inking stage and one at the initial drawing stage.
Wistman’s Wood
Another two block, reduction print, but this time using Ternes Burton registration pins – a world of difference and how on earth I managed before, I really don’t know! This is the first time ever that I have started on a print run of ten and ended up with ten good prints – hurray! The image is of Wistman’s Wood, a particularly twisted and tangled woodland in Dartmoor, in places so dense that it is almost impossible to get through. Everything there seems to be green – the mossy stones, the leaves, the tree trunks – hence the overall green colour of the print.
A Stranger Raven
This is the latest image from my series inspired by the children’s novel, “A Stranger Came Ashore” by Mollie Hunter. In this, the finale, Robbie is standing on the edge of a ‘voe’ (a bay or inlet in the Shetlands) about to be beaten by The Great Selkie when, as promised, his school teacher Yarl Corbie appears in his ‘other’ magical form as a gigantic Raven, and attacks the Selkie, gouging out his eyes and sending him off into the ocean, never to entice the young girls into his underwater palace again.
This was quite a tricky reduction print, using two blocks and a lot of fingers-crossed guesswork! I did also cut a larger (A4) version of the raven to be printed independently.
Tools of My Other Trade
Ordinarily, my job as a musician runs alongside my work as a visual artist. However, these are not ordinary times and, as such, I haven’t been able to perform with the band for almost a year now. In light of this, I decided to try and get ‘close’ to my instruments again and represent them in a lino print. This is the result – intentionally black and white and intentionally simple. I do play guitar as well but another instrument would have affected the balance of the image.
Mermaid
This image started life as a drawing of an Asrai – a sea creature with webbed feet and hands, that is occasionally but rarely seen by man. However, half-way through the designing process, I decided to change it to a mermaid as this is an image more people would be familiar with. The design is printed using Traditional Gold Ink on blue, Japanese Washi Paper.
Avebury Magic
For some time now, I have been wanting to make a print of the magical stones to be found at the World Heritage Site of Avebury – one of the biggest stone circles in Europe. Having tried (and failed miserably) to do a collagraph print, I settled back on a lino cut. However, this time I used sponges rather than rollers to apply the inks to give it more of a textured finish. Whilst there are undoubtedly some flaws evident, I am generally very pleased with the finished result; there is a very graphic quality to the image but that reflects my drawing style, which has always ended up with quite well-defined, thick lines, even when I try not to!
Minster Man
For the November round of the “One of Many Postcard” initiative, I decided to take the image of the Green Man that can be seen carved at the top of one of the columns inside Rotherham Minster. The original carving has the traditional vines issuing from the mouth but I wanted to isolate (and flatten) the face. The postcard version was slightly cropped to fit the card size, but here is the full, uncropped version. The background was made using sponges rather than a roller.
A Place To Rest
Having come to the end of their time in the chapel at Wentworth Woodhouse, I was delighted to be asked if I would consider placing them in the ‘Forest Classroom’ at St Thomas’ Primary School in Rotherham. Of course I agreed, and spent a wet morning positioning them appropriately. It was quickly apparent that this was where they truly belonged; nestled amongst the trees and bushes, enhanced by, and enhancing the natural setting. I realise that, being made from MDF, the panels probably won’t last very long before rotting, but that too seems an appropriate end to their life.
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