Hallo everyone……its a very lovely wet autumnal October morning and I was very glad to have spent it at Sonsoles Print Studio, in Peckham. Yesterday morning was happily spent prepping my screens - stripping off the old images and exposing new ones, always exciting as my methods can either work really well, or not! As the drying rack above proves, this morning was fairly productive printmaking wise……..let me walk you through some of my newest ideas for new works……
Leaves from the ‘Shadow Bush’
I absolutely L O V E autumn, fresher days, scarves, maybe gloves, bright days, colours completely in focus and then there are the trees and all of that fabulous shedding. For me its dreamy, eyes on the ground collecting things that may work for prints, in truth most of the time its a case of, oooohh that could make a print! This happened just a fortnight ago with the wonderful tree outside our bedroom window when I went out to the car and just saw piles of stems all criss crossed on the ground. So lots of collecting and drying out before they could go to the next stage.
I just love how they fell, completely randomly…
I also love the leaves of the ‘shadow plant’, very deep purpley plum in colour and they have the exquisite spindly stems that just seem to print so well. I found some really big leaves some weeks ago and left them drying out in a magazine. I have piles of magazines with all manner of collected leaves inside, some from Italy, where we are lucky to holiday as my husband is Italian and Nonna lives just south of Pisa on the glorious coast! Anyway, thankfully my obsession with leaf collecting has found a place immortalised a bit in my work.
New ideas for my work fall as randomly as the seeds and leaves fall and I find that I can’t force the process if I want the work to be as fresh as possible. Over the last 2 years my practice has certainly evolved and grown which is really nice to witness first hand.
Laying old the old screens and planning the new images!
So, the positives for my screens are the leaves and stems themselves, as well as black card stencils as these will block out all of the light and come out as very flat blocks of ink. This time, I also trialled using black acrylic shapes with large paint brushes and I found the exposure process quite liked them too! Phew!!
You can see how well the stems processed to the screen….
So, today I was able to go back to the Sonsoles Print Studio to get my hands dirty and actually use the print tables for the first time since March, I am just glad that I remembered how to do it all again!
You can see some of the works in progress below……a glimpse anyway
First 2 layers going down……I am so in love love love with taupe! The dark leaf colour is actually inky blue grey, inspired by a fence colour I saw yesterday!!
There will be more layers to add tomorrow, I heartily thank the printmaking gods and goddesses for a two week half term break!!! This means I get to the print studio for a sweep of mornings which is fabulous!!
Adding new inky layers to monoprints…
So readers, this is a tiny glimpse of some new works that I need to finish, photograph and then add to my shop.
Please check back so you can see the finished works!
If you have any quibbles or questions then do get in touch!
Come on a N A T U R E W A L K with me next week!