Working Methods: Footprints In The Sand(ing)

Negative Footprint in White Emulsion Dust, May 2020

There's not too much to say about this - I'm sure you can work out what happened, and it's just further proof that all the best marks occur by complete chance.  I'd be tempted to say yet more new work is clearly afoot - but I fear that really would be unacceptable.

'Constructed City' 13: Laid Off

All Images: 'Constructed City' Screen Prints (Work in Progress),
Leicester Print Workshop, March 2020

For fairly obvious reasons, my regular printing activities at Leicester Print Workshop are now on hold for the foreseeable future.  In fact, it's already been two weeks since I made my last visit - during the second of which, my school workplace has also been mostly closed.  Like much of the population, I'm effectively living a locked-down life, and wondering just how different life will be in the future.  I'm choosing to believe there is 'life', and a 'future', if for no other reason that agonising over the alternative is futile and leads absolutely nowhere.  Who knows? - we may even emerge from all this, one day, a little wiser, if significantly chastened - and thus inclined to construct a slightly saner future.

Anyway, while we wait indoors, to find out whether or not this really is Armageddon, creative work remains as resilient a bulwark against negativity and despair, as it ever was.  I can't print, so have made the decision to expand the scope of my 'Constructed City' project to include painting as well - and have begun preparing a reasonably large shaped panel, accordingly.  But more of that in due course.  For now, it seems only reasonable to draw a line under what I achieved on my last couple of trips to LPW, before it closed.    

The good news is that I was able to bring all the pre-existing prints in progress to some kind of conclusion, in one way or another.  In many cases that involved adding new layers of (a slightly sickly) muted yellow, or of a lightish grey, and of black.  that yellow felt like a bit of a risk, but it actually helped to modulate some of the problematic bright yellow sheets, which had been bugging me slightly for many weeks.  As usual, the addition of more black provided a pretty direct way to tie together those last few that been refusing to just 'sit down' properly.

The results are both darker and denser than I originally envisaged, and I may have to drastically rethink my original idea that these images would function largely as backgrounds.  But that's okay - there's plenty of pleasingly nuanced detail going on within all that multi-layered complexity.  And, if it wasn't already obvious - it proves that an intuitive, in-the-moment, decision making approach works better for me, these days, than too much pre-planning.  It's essentially how my paintings have evolved in recent years, and it seems that's the kind of printer I'm going to be too.  One day, I might set myself the task of producing a technically slick, consistent edition of prints, but for now, there aren't two alike - and all that limitless variation feels fine by me.  It's also appears I'm unlikely to be adopting a less-is-more approach, anytime soon.  That's okay too - I've always tended more to a maximalist's approach to problem solving.  We can only be the artists we were always going to be, regardless of medium. 

Anyway, there's not much else to say about these - so I'll let you judge for yourself, for now.  In reality, much remains up for grabs, even now, as it's still my intention to start cutting up and reconfiguring many of these - collage style.  That in itself, will involve another round of improvisation and intuitive decision making.  The next time you see them, they may look considerably different all over again. 

It only remains to express the hope that anyone reading this, along with all those you care about, can remain safe and healthy in the coming weeks and months.  Whatever your circumstances - I hope they remain survivable, and that the 'symptoms' any of us may succumb to, are as mild as possible.  And, ultimately, nothing's changed really - I'm still resolved to just keep making stuff until I no longer can.

'Constructed City' 12: K

All images: 'Constructed City' Screen Prints (Work In Progress), Leicester Print Workshop, February 2020

The rash of redevelopment work currently transforming sectors of Leicester is progressing, almost faster than my own 'Constructed City' project that feeds on it.  Nevertheless, printing work continues whenever I can get into Leicester Print Workshop, and a steady momentum is being maintained, thankfully.

The black layers have now been added to the first of my CMYK 'fragments', and, whilst there are always a few technical duds amongst any run of prints (or, any of mine - at least), there are also enough good 'uns to go into the pot.  This includes several completely 'straight' versions of the image, along with various other deliberately miss-registered experiments, and others where one or another of the CMYK colours were omitted, or where white was added to the four inks.

While preparing for the next of these primarily photographic images, I've also returned to the more free-form and increasingly layered prints that have been in play for quite a while now.  I began by thinking of these as potential backgrounds, but as many are now so dense with imagery, I may need to revise that notion a bit.  As I've mentioned before, the ultimate aim is to reconfigure all this stuff through a process of collage - and until then, it's futile to pre-judge exactly how well one section or another might sit.

The real trick is to resist the urge to think of any single print as a definitive image in its own right.  That's increasingly difficult, as some of them appear to reach something resembling individual resolution, and the desire to have some finished 'product' nags away.  But the key to this way of working is to keep all possibilities open for as long as possible, and to be prepared to 'kill one's darlings' at any stage.

It's all a bit Tantric, in terms of delayed gratification, I suppose, but all I can do is relish the mounting sense of anticipation.  I'm still in the generating-content phase for now, but definitely looking forward to the point when the chopping-up and rejoining can commence.  It feels a little closer, and hopefully - that's when something even more significant will emerge.  If not - I guess I'll still have loads of photos of inky screens...
   

  

'Constructed City' 11: C

All Images: 'Constructed City' Screen Prints (Work In progress), Leicester Print Workshop,
February, 2020

...And the Cyan layer goes on to the first of my CMYK separated photographic 'Fragments'.  The aim is to print a small edition of these as straight as possible, with the occurring at a later collage stage.  Inevitably though, a few minor accidents, and a few deliberate experiments have crept in along the way too.  I'll see exactly what I've actually got, once the black goes on.  With valuable Half Term hours on the horizon - that should be achieved by the end of this month.

'Constructed City 10': Y/M

All Images: 'Constructed City' Screen Prints (Work In Progress), Leicester Print Workshop,
January 2020

Progress continues apace, and the yellow, and much of the magenta, have gone down on the first of my 'fragments'.  These colour-separated images will ultimately supply a wholly photographic element within my proposed 'Constructed City' composites, and I'm hoping there'll be quite a few.  One thing at a time though; for now I just need to concentrate on keeping that registration as tight as possible.

'Fragment' (Source Image), Photo-Manipulated Digital Image.

'Constructed City 9': Clocking Back On

All Images: 'Constructed City' Screen Prints (Work In Progress), Leicester Print Workshop,January 2020

Having filled-in the Festive print studio recess with a bit of cheeky painting action, I got back into Leicester Print Workshop, the other weekend, and picked-up from where I exited 2019, with the 'Constructed City' project.

I spent an hour or two laying down another grey layer on some of my still-active prints (which, like everything else, should ultimately form sections of something larger), but the main effort really went into preparing some new screens.  These will be used to print the first CMYK element of the project, and thus represent a significant step forward in a project that, for purely logistical reasons, is progressing incrementally.

In the long-run, there'll be a number of these photographic CMYK sections, and it occurs to me that their actual printing should become fairly rapid (being largely a matter of mechanically reproducing already resolved images).  Hopefully, that means the whole project will feel like it's accelerating into 2020.  We can but hope.

There's little else of significance to say just now - so I'll detain you no longer, and we can all just get on with our day.

'Constructed City' 8: Designated Break

All Images: 'Constructed City' Screen Prints (Work in Progress), Leicester Print Workshop, December 2019

At the risk of over-saturating the internet with yet more images of my 'Constructed City' screen prints in progress - here is the last instalment of the year/decade.  Apologies if anyone is bored with these, but it still seems preferable to keep reporting on ongoing activity, than to go dark in the absence of definitively completed work.

Leicester Print Workshop is closed now, until mid January - so I was pleased to have grabbed a last chance to put in a few hours just before Christmas, if only to maintain the gentle, but steady momentum that's built around this project.  The studio lay-off also allows time for a little reflection on what's been achieved to date, and how things might progress in the new year.  There's a sizeable stack of these closely-related images now - some of them having reached a considerable level of intensity and multi-layered complexity.  But the reality is, these wallpapered girder motifs were originally only intended to supply a kind of background layer for more photographically detailed elements, as per my original sketchbook collages.

'Constructed City' Sketchbook Collage Study, October 2019

It's probably the case that some of these are already a little too concentrated to serve that purpose, but it's definitely still my intention to combine at least some with less abstracted elements.  The current plan is that many such new motifs will be arrived at as four-colour separations; which will both capitalise on the training course I completed at LPW, last year -  and give visitors here a different kind of work-in-progress shot (if nothing else) in 2020.  In fact, the ultimate aim is that these 'CC' pieces should eventually build into much larger composites, through a process of collage - spreading exponentially, in much the same way that new developments are currently filling-in significant sections of the Leicester street map, and skyline.

Consequently, whilst I suspect there'll be no shortage of 'Sit. Rep.'-type bulletins to come - I can also only hope that what you see here (and in various recent posts), will eventually be revealed as merely the early stages of something rather more impressive.  As ever - we'll see...