Initially I developed the silouette of the four figures with small outline sketches from the photos. It was surprising how much you could define the individual character and expression of each figure with simple outlines, I also wanted to get the right position of each figure in relation to the others.
When I had the silouette shape I wanted in A3 size I cut it out and tried various ways of using it to get some more ideas. The broad initial idea I had was to use the outlines as containers for expressive marks.
I did some small stencils trying them out on different papers and on one I used white ink on black paper. This struck me a being a novel way of using the image and had the effect of making the figures quite ghostly which was fitting.
The bit of paper I had used as the stencil was from a ring bound notebook and the holes at the top of the paper where it had been bound made an interesting texture. I thought I could actually have writing in the background as if the ghostly figures were leaving a message for the living.
I wasn't sure whether the figures should be facing left or write and I decided that the figures should be facing to the top left corner where the writing would begin. I felt that most people would see the writing and read the image from left to right.
One of the hardest tasks with this print was carving the writing backwards. I had chosen the words from a song that related to the image.
I took a large A3 sheet of lino and distressed it using a screwdriver, bleach and an old bread knife then laid the stencil over the top and printed the initial image from it. Once I had cut the writing on a separate bit of lino I printed that onto the initial image, slightly at an angle. Finally I took a bit of paper torn from a spiral bound sketchbook and printed from that also.
Evaluation of print One
The cut marks on the lino gave my figures a worn, eroded appearance which was in keeping with the idea of the passage of time and the fragmentation of memories. The edge of the stencil had created a white line which created my 'container'.
The figures looking to the top left corner almost made me feel they were reading the writing in the background and the eye is definitely drawn to the beginning of the writing.
The slanting, perforated print from the ring bound sketch book paper signposts the fact that the writing is a hurriedly drawn letter, probably from the front to a loved one back home. It's a bit smaltzy but I justify it on the basis that it is also an interesting textural and compositional effect!
I had not envisaged this print particularly, it sort of happened but it is a simple statement made all the more evocative by being printed in white on black.
Print Two
For print Two I wanted to take the same image and stencils used for print One and try and resolve the problems I had experienced in my collatype project. I had felt my collatypes were very textural but lacked solidity and I wanted to strike a better balance between texture and form.
I constructed a collatype block using steel wool and carborundum and masked out the figures using a stencil then printed in blue onto Fabriano which I found very soft and pleasing to work with when sprayed with water. I did three prints then reversed the stencil and printed the figures using oil paint as ink so that they didn't get too solid.
I then did further mono prints on the background in a variety of colours using gestural back drawing and finally used my lino block from print One which I masked out and printed dark shadows from.
Evaluation of print Two series
Whilst I had great fun printing these prints the results were less exciting. I think I should have spent more time on my colour choices rather than just launching into it and then my initial idea would've reached a higher level.
Print Three (extracts from my notebook)3.9.11
I found two offcuts of beech laminate and joined them together to make a block big enough to do an A3 print from. On each block the grain goes in a different way and they are not quite square which is interesting. I am going to do my four soldiers from the cemetery at Langemark using reduction woodcut and monoprint.
For the background I want to feintly print from the wooden block so that I get the grain of the wood and the line where the two blocks are joined together. I then want to monoprint a very thinly inked plate that has been vigourously marked with a brush over the initial print. At this point the figures will be masked out.
I will then chisel out the background of the block, losely cresting the shapes of tree branches as I did in my collagraph assignment with the bunker at Hill 60. The background should resemble a forest.
When I cut the figures I am not sure how I will approach the task. Part of me is thinking about the shelte drawings of Henry Moore and my earlier work based on the grave of Sarah Wrench but this might not work well against the delicate background I am aiming at. I'm going to use the same colour scheme as I used for the CHine colle assignment as it worked well and modify the colours as I go. With the reduction cutting of the figures I'm going to work from a light grey to a dark grey with all the colours in between being tonal shades of the same colour. I think I will experiment with the background o other smaller bits of beech before committing to the main block and likewise when I have a background I like I will experiment with the figures.
4.9.11
I did some experiments with small wooden beech blocks to try and firm up my ideas about the background. I was going to use a very light blue for the initial monoprint but instead opted for a very light pink. I found the most subtle effect was achieved by rollering the beech block with pink ink, lifting off most with paper then printing again but vigourously backdrawing the reverse of the paper with the edge of a wooden spoon. The combination of soft wood and backdrawing gave a very soft feel, slightly textured.
I decided that against this pink background a range of grey greens would work so I mixed up a grey green from viridian, a small amount of burnt sienna and white and printed from my glass plate onto the pink prints I had done from the small beech blocks. Again removing surplus ink by pre printing with a piece of scrap paper and then back drawing for the print proper worked best.
5.9.11
The test prints worked well so I have started on the A3 versions. The only problem was that the block I had made from two separate offcuts was not square and caused me problems in masking out a thind white border.
Once I had printed the pink on three sheets of Fabriano (now my paper of choice) I did a monprint in the light green from the glass plate onto the top third of the pink A3 portrait prints. I scrubbed the grey green ink with a hogs hair brush and vigourously back drew with a spoon to get interesting textures. I had originally planned to do test prints of the figures before cutting the main block but I was carried away by the moment(!) and went straight to cutting the block. I love the feeling of carving a wooden block with sharp tools, lino doesn't compare.
I had planned to use the reduction method for the figures so i was quite careful not to remove too much wood with this initial cut. However I was begining to get a very clear idea of how the tress in the background would work best. I felt that whippy lines, interweaving and spreading like Hazel wands would have the same effect as the striations I had used in the background of my chine colle prints so I cut these with sublime curves filling the whole of the background behind the figures.
I mixed up a dark green and inked up the block and printed the image onto the three bits of paper already prepared with a general pink background and light green textured mono printing.
Several things occurred to me on appraising my handiwork:
1.The woodcut had a primitive hewn feel that did indeed remind me of Henry Moores tube shelter drawings. It really didn't need further overprinting.
2. Where the dark green had overprinted the pink without the light green monoprinting it was most effective and where the monoprinted light green ink appeared alongside this combination it detracted from it.
3. Conversely where the monoprinted light green appeared in the top of the image where the branches had been printed it worked.
All this said to me that I needed to be much more specific about where I printed the light green mid tone before the final dark green wood cut print, more specifically no mono printing of light green in the area of the figures.
I probably haven't explained this very clearly!
At this point I realised that my original idea to use a light blue as an initial background print would work just as well as the light pink so why not do light blue for the tree area background and light pink for the figures background?
I decided to do a further quick trial print combining these ideas and using stencils I quickly printed the blue and pink areas. Although it was rough the rgistration was still accurate and then equally roughly I printed the light green mono print in the top quarter of the image (avoiding the figure areas completely. I then inked up the wood block with dark green and did a single print.
I was pleasantly surprised at how the dark green wood block print had pulled evrything together. Furthermore the roughness of the underprinting actually complimented the wood block printing. You can see where the two blocks have been joined together and also the fact that it isn't square and has a bit jutting out of the side seems to add to the 'carved' quality of the print.
Because you can see how the block has been put together with all its imperfections it has a history and speaks of the work of the artists hands.
I have written at length about thsi process because I want to understand how my creative mind works. I am very interested to learn how much I should plan and how much I should let happen. Sometimes the accidents work and I don't want to be so inflexible and fixed that I can't take advantage of happy accidents when they occur.
These notes will be very useful in the future.
Print Four
After finishing Print Three I cut up the preparatory prints and stuck my favourite bits on a sheet of A3 so that I could analyse them and try to find new ideas for Print Four. I particularly liked this bit which has a sinister menace. I think the fact that it has no face gives it this atmosphere but also it appears to be lurking in the shadows like a stranger standing in the corner of a room on a moonlit night.
Compositionally I thought this small bit of print only 3 inches tall and 2 inches wide might work at A3 size because it has strong vertical and horizontal lines balanced by the sinuous curve of the neck and head. I thought it possible that it might actually be too strong and so I planned to introduce an area of chine colle in the top left corner to add interest and give it another dimension.
I decided to use the colour scheme I had employed in the previous print as it had worked well and so I printed up three sheets of Fabriano with a mono printed light blue background and a mono printed pink head using stencils. I introduced some collagraph textures to the head in substitute for the lighter green 'shadows' on the original.
I then used up some of the orange tissue paper I had left from the chine colle project and stuck it to the area behind the head. I knew from previous experience that it would create some interesting mid tones where it overlay the monoprinting beneath.
Finally I took an A3 sheet of lino and traced onto it the enlarged image which I had taken from a photocopy of the original increased to A3 size on the photocopier. I cut out the image on the lino and printed a very dark green from it.
Of the three prints the one I thought worked best had the most uptake of dark green ink on the print and there was a slight mis registration of the stencils which created an interesting blue area behind the head I hadn't planned for.
Evaluation of Print Four
It wasn't as menacing as the original but still looked sinister mainly due to the strong lines and lack of facial features. I thought the colours worked well and the tissue paper did what I had anticipated and added another area of texture and colour for interest. I think that if I had more time I would have done extensive colour notes to find new combinations and would also have experimented with the textures of the monoprints. I would also have tried different types and colour of tissue paper for the Chine colle section.
