Author: stockportinprint

I specialize in printmaking especially etching aquatint and my other passion is painting seascapes and landscapes in acrylics. I am also interested in photography and experimenting with digital art. As a starting point, I use a mixture of sketches and photography to create prints and paintings. The artwork and design featured on this web site originates from my school, college and university days and also more recent work that I have created from regular printmaking workshops and art holidays. I regularly exhibit my art in the annual Stockport Art Guild exhibition of which I am a member.

Reaching Out Exhibition

I will be showing a number of prints from the Stockport In Print project at the ‘Reaching Out’ from figurative to abstract art exhibition from 30th June to 7th August 2016, Castle Park Arts Centre, Frodsham, Cheshire.

Free entry every day

10am-4pm

All Welcome.

www.inciteart.org

In this exhibition, Incite Art Collective brings together a group of North West artists working in a variety of media bound by a common pursuit of excellence and imagination, originality and innovation.

Meet the artists evening

Friday 1st July 7-9pm

All are welcome

All artwork is for sale

 Address: Castle Park Arts Centre, Frodsham

off Fountain Lane, Cheshire, WA6 6SE.

Main car park in Castle Park

Coloured prints

Today, I have been working on two different printmaking techniques; Linocut and Gum Arabic printing.

I am hoping to produce more of these photo litho prints over the next few weeks and have a list of print subjects as a starting point.

I need to stock up on some copperplate oil which is used to make the printing ink more loose and easily to work with. I apply ink using a brush to a carbon toner type photocopy already treated with Gum Arabic solution both sides. I then wipe off the excess ink with a sponge and water spray. I add small pieces of coloured tissue paper over the photocopy using the ‘Chine Colle’ tissue paper technique and then apply pva glue on the up side of the tissue paper. I then get soaked Fabriano printing paper, blotted and placed together with the photocopy in the printing press. If I’m lucky, I can usually get another print off the photocopy before it breaks up due being soaked in Gum Arabic and ink. I still have to apply more ink first before I attempt the second print.

The seven coloured Linocut is a continuation of the St. Georges church print I have been working on over the last few months. I printed the fourth colour today using a mixture of Lime green and Prussian blue. I still have three more colours to add and have an edition of approximately 30 prints in all. It’s been one of the most complex prints I’ve worked on so far for this project and have learnt a lot about the reduction Lino technique from my mentor Alan Birch.

Linocut: New colours just added

Today, I added the second and third layers of colour to my reduction linocut of St George’s church. The registration went well for nearly all of the 30 prints so far.

I have another three colours remaining to add to this print which is coming on nicely. I am using water based inks for this print.

 

  
  

Reduction linocut: 1st stage

I am currently in the process of producing a multi layered reduction linocut of at least 4 colours. I will be printing from the lightest to darkness colours. Here are some photos from the first stage of linocut reduction print of St. Georges church. I’m looking forward to the results of this print and hoping to do a series of lino’s for this project.


  

Air Raid Shelters etching

During a full weekend of printing, I completed a new etching for the project which depicts the Air Raid Shelters in Stockport which apparently during World War II could accommodate up to 3,850 civilians when it was opened in 1939. This was then extended to allow up to 6,500 civilians making them the largest purpose built shelters in the country.

During a guided visit a few years ago, I was able to capture on camera the warren of red sandstone tunnels which extends for up to 1 mile in total.

This time I produced a number of different versions of this print; some in sepia, black ink and I also added colour to some prints using a fine brush to colour in the bunting and the Union Jack flag. I also used an etching crayon and aquatint to depict the sandstone walls.

  

Trip to London

While in the capital earlier this month, I visited the Intaglio Printmakers shop based in a small basement in Southwark, south London.

I had planned to visit this shop for some time and as it’s only a ten minute walk from Tate Modern, I decided I wasn’t going to miss the opportunity. I wasn’t disappointed, it was like a sweet shop for printers, with everything you could imagine a printmaker would need.

I decided I needed some more printing inks and purchased a number of primary colours and shades which I hope to use not just for printing etchings but also lino-cuts. I hope to develop skills in linocut this year and have a list of buildings I want to capture in relief printing.

It been two years since I setup this blog and started what has been a fruitful and interesting project.

Here’s to another productive year.

  

Viaduct and Bus Terminal

Here is one of my cyanotype prints I produced a few years ago at a workshop.

According to Wilkipedia, a Cyanotype is a photographic printing process that produces a cyan-blue print. Engineers used the process well into the 20th century as a simple and low-cost process to produce copies of drawings, referred to as blueprints. The process uses two chemicals: ammonium iron(III) citrate and potassium ferricyanide.

Viaduct_bus_station