Samuel Palmer

Just finished Rachel Campell-Johnston's biography of Samuel Palmer, Mysterious Wisdom. A fairly breezy read with very little real insight into his work (which is odd from an art critic), and a glaring cock-up when she confuses engraving with etching. However, it reads well and gives a well-rounded view of Palmer, and is at times very moving.

New print: Exeter

Busy thinking about the new print, which needs to be ready and framed in time for the Exeter themed exhibition organised by Double Elephant Print Workshop at the Phoenix in, er, Exeter. In order to give it that unmistakable Exeter theme I need to include some reference to the cathedral, and taking my cue from my all-time hero Ben Nicholson I thought I would also include a little Devon flag. However, the immediate problem is rendering the cathedral tower (left) into a linocut in the same style as the rest of the print.....watch this space.

Exeter Open Studios 2011

Well that's it for another year, and my first Exeter Open Studios in my own studio (left) was a great success, with alot of interest, many encouraging comments and some serious buyers: so a very big thank you to all that came and an even bigger thank you to those who bought. Now I have to sort out the framing requests.

Waterstones display

Just taken my Waterstones display down, which was well worth doing as it brought in some sales for Exeter Open Studios. Interesting times for Waterstones and their (on the whole) less than inspiring staff.

New series of still lifes

It has been a while since my last post, and I have moved away from my Bridget Riley phase, and pure abstraction in general. Contrary to what you may intuitively think I find the pure abstracts far more difficult than the more representational work: it is easy to see when you have it wrong but far more difficult to see when it is right, and endlessly moving shapes about starts to mess with your head after a while.

Anyway, after revealing my two new still lifes, Manda's Mug (the print is inspired by a painting by Manda Beeching) and Fig and Jug (left) at this years Exeter Open Studios and finding that they were very well received (3 sales of Manda and 2 of Fig) I have decided to do at least 3 more. Not only that, they are rather fun to make. So it is less Ben Nicholson and more Winifred from here on in!

I hope to document the process of creation of the next one (provisionally entitled Exeter) as I go along, so watch this space.

New work in progress...

Someone wanted to see how my prints take shape, so until I get round to documenting the whole process here is the final stage to my last print.

Here the final plate is inked up. As there is now more backing plate than image plate it is impossible to keep the ink off the plate.

As this would be picked up by the paper (which I don't want) I cut out a template that blocks the inky backing plate, leaving only the image plate.

The final image on the drying rack next to one waiting to be finished.

The plate can now be binned.

Finished work.