July’s been good to me so far, offering plenty of daylight and long, long days to get things done. The days of intense heat we experienced in the UK turned normally stiff ink into liquid which hampered the progress of some editions – nevertheless with the ongoing changes to our climate threatening life, livelihood and home for so many around the world, I can hardly complain.
My obsession with Silbury Hill in Wiltshire continues, with my first view of the great hill completed and an edition under way, I have begun a larger linocut version. This is now roughed out onto a block and ready for me to determine what kind of marks I want to use to describe tree and leaf, hill and down.
I’m hoping to have some fun with this and find a new vocabulary for the view I’ve become so accustomed to (albeit in reverse most of the time).
Card packs
I decided to try some eco-friendly packaging for my 3-pack of Wildflower cards. These aren’t available yet but when I get them refined I’ll update the shop listings.
First steps with wood engraving
Earlier this month I invested in some good quality tools for wood engraving. Where other printmakers have inspired me over the years, I have been particularly drawn to wood engravers.
Engraved works by artists such as Eric Ravilious, Ethelbert White, Gwenda Morgan and Iain McNab have for a long time given me inspiration for my linocut work. This has been a blessing and a curse, as I aim for the same precision and scale I see in their work using modern linoleum tools and blocks. The blessing has been developing the techniques and adapting tools to get ever finer lines, while the curse has been the hours spent trying to get a fine, detailed impression from those blocks. More on this later.
In recent weeks I’ve been working on end grain wood from reclaimed blocks, doing test cuts to teach me how the tools behave and how certain marks may be achieved. Eventually I returned to the subject of Silbury Hill, this time one of the most impressive views – the approach along the footpath from the end of the West Kennett Avenue at the southern end of Waden Hill. Walking this route, Silbury is revealed to you spectacularly as you reach the top of the hill.
A few days of intermittent cutting and I had my first completed wood engraving.
At just 22mm high, it might be the smallest print block I’ve made. Thankfully inking and impression with this material is somewhat simpler that attempting the same with linocut, I’ve been able to roll relief ink with a small, hard roller and take impressions by hand with the trusty wooden spoon.
With final-state proofs taken I am delighted with how this has come out, so I’ll be producing a short edition of prints for the print shop and Etsy store from this very soon.
Taking editions
I’ve been in the habit of trying to complete limited editions over 1 or 2 days from a block being completed. For more detailed blocks this can be troublesome as the block’s finer grooves quickly become ink-filled. After many lost hours trying to take good impressions from these blocks I’ve realised a better approach is to take just 2 or 3 impressions per day. This gives me highest quality prints from a clean block, and far fewer failures.
The block is then cleaned and left to dry naturally before it is put in a small press to keep it level, ready for the next day.
Other work
I have a number of irons in the fire, prints in progress over recent months that still need work. These include my reduction print of Hammerton Hall and my plans for a larger scale white-line scenes from our flower borders for which I continue to sketch. These will no doubt be pursued in earnest as July concludes and August arrives.