Lots of new prints!

Hi there

Well, in lieu of the usual happenings at this time of year (lots of events), instead I have a load of new prints to show you! One small positive about this awful covid situation is that I've had time to work on and develop new ideas. More birds, more stones and, of course, more donkeys....

So there are clearly no live events taking place for the rest of the year. This is obviously the right thing to be doing, but I have to say I do miss travelling around, bumping into fellow artists/crafters and seeing the friendly faces of the visitors. I'm sure I'm not the only one. Hopefully things can get back to normal before too long next year. 

Anyway, here my new prints (All are available in my Folksy shop via the links in the titles):

Magic Donkey No.1

A3 size 2-colour screen-print

The new magic donkey prints are perhaps from the far-reaches of donkey-world, where things get pretty surreal. Or maybe they are just donkey-dreams? I had a lot of fun playing with transparency on these two print. Despite what you might think, you never quite know what  you'll get when you mix red and blue...Both are in editions of 25.

Magic Donkey No.2

A3 size 2-colour screen-print

The Donkey Moon (orange/green) and The Donkey Moon (pink/blue)

A3 size 2-colour linocut/screen-print

These prints came about after I just had this idea in my head about a donkey-moon. The moon is synonymous with lots of things, but in my mind there needed one more addition, being that special time where creature and planet are together. Makes sense, eh? The orange print is in edition of 15, and the pink an edition of 27.

Hooded Crow

A4 size 2-colour linocut print

This is the last, and probably most rare of all the corvids (well, at least in the UK anyway). A curious crow found mainly in Ireland and the west of Scotland, although they do trave lto the east coast of the UK in the winter. This is the last in my current series of corvid prints (eight in total). Printed in an edition of 100.

Jay

A4 size 2-colour linocut print

The penultimate corvid print in the series, I love the colouring of this one, as it is so different from it's cousins. I have seen them on occasions in our garden, but they never hang around for long! Printed in an edition of 100.

Five Stones

A4 size 6-colour reduction linocut print

Following on from my six large stone compositions, I decided to create a few smaller pieces, but still in the same slightly abstracted manner. Theses ones are reduction linocuts, a method I rarely use (in which the whole image is cut from one piece of lino, printing subsequently darker colours, then cutting more away as you go along). Printed in an edition of only seven.

Three Stones

A4 size 10-colour reduction linocut print

This print breaks my record for the most colours used! It did take quite a while to work out, but I think it was worth it in the end. Printed in an edition of only six.

Small Stone Study

A5 size 4-colour reduction linocut print

Although this was the smallest of the stone prints, it was probably the trickiest! Achieving the level of detail I was after took quite some time, as was getting the colour balance right. Printed in an edition of only ten.

White Donkey Dream

A2 size 3-colour screen-print

This print came about through experimenting with mark-making and playing with bitmapping (creating shading with dot patterns). The spheres are loosely related to the monoliths, and the donkey is having a somewhat confusing dream. Printed in an edition of 16.

Donkey Monolith No.9

76 x 56cm, 3-colour linocut/screen-print

This is so far my biggest donkey print, and is a follow-up to my 2019 DM series. The lone donkey finds itself in a most confusing and optically challenging landscape, but nevertheless it will have a great adventure! The print is in an edition of 18, printed on lovely Somerset paper.

Happenings In Donkey World No.5

A2 size 3-colour screen-print

If you've followed my donkey prints for a while, you'll be aware of the 'Happenings..' series. In this print, the donkey is guided across the strange landscape by a 'helping hand'. I had a dream about the shape of this print, so had to then make a drawing, the rest all fell into place! The print is in an edition of 14.

Donkey And Seven Hills

30x30cm 2-colour linocut/screen-print.woodcut

I create this print, in collaboration with fellow artist/printmaker John Pedder for my recent exhibition with him at Cupola Gallery in Sheffield. It was a lot of fun working with another artist on a project, and this idea seemed to work very naturally. There were three different versions, and ten prints of each, but I only have one left each of versions 2 and 3!

Phew! Sorry for the bombardment. I told you I'd been busy.. I'll go now. Take care x

New exhibition and more....

Hi there

I've got lots of new works to show you this month, however no news on events and workshops. It is likely that events might not happen until the end of the year now, and most probably workshops too.

NEW EXHIBITION!
Despite the current Covid 19 situation I've been focussing myself on producing new work, mostly for an exhibition I have upcoming in Sheffield at Cupola Contemporary Art Gallery. The exhibition is a collection of work I have chosen from the last two years, and focusses mainly on my stone and donkey prints. It is called 'Works 2018-2020' (very functional title, eh?), and features 20 pieces, including 7 new ones. Alongside the exhibition is another show by my friend and fellow printmaker John Pedder, showing a retrospective of his work. The shows runs from 18th July until 22nd August 2020, and the preview evening is on 17th July between 6pm and 10pm. In order to attend this you'll need to book a time slot by contacting the gallery.

Here is a video of me talking to gallery director Karen Sherwood about the exhibition:

and here is a sneak preview of the new prints:

One of the prints is featured on the exhibition poster, and is a collaboration between myself and John. We printed up a small edition of 27, and they are available from the show and our own websites. The print is woodcut, linocut and screen-print! If you can't make it along to the exhibition and would like one of the new prints, I will list any that are left in my Folksy shop.

OTHER NEW WORKS
I've also created two new poster-prints:

Swallows

I see a lot of these birds round where I live (I'm sure you do too). Rather than go for a single bird this time, and one standing, I wanted to capture them in flight, and in the acrobatic troops you sometimes see them in. The print is now available as an A3 poster-print. You can find it in my Folksy shop.

Donkey Puzzle

This is an A3 poster-print version of the hand-pressed linocut I created a few months ago. I don't normally produce a poster-print and original at the same time, but I really liked the change of colours and scale on this one, for some reason! You can find it in my Folksy shop now.

BEARS OF SHEFFIELD

For two weeks in June I had the fortune of painting a great big fibreglass bear in a warehouse on the outskirts of Sheffield It is for a charity project called 'Bears Of Sheffield', which is a follow-up to the 'Herd Of Sheffield' elephant project I also took part in a few years ago. 40 or so artists from around the county are asked to transform a blank bear into a piece of art, and they will then be displayed as a 'trail' around the city for people to look at. At the end of the trail period all of the bears will be auctioned off to raise money for the Sheffield Children's Hospital. Because of Covid, the trial has now been postponed until the summer of 2021, but I'm sure it'll be worth waiting for! Here is sneak preview of my finished bear.

How things change..

Hi there

Well, last time I posted, it was before Christmas, and life was very different. If someone had explained about the situation we are in now, I'm not sure I would have believed them.

I'm not going to go over things you already know about Coronavirus, but I hope that you're all ok, and hope that this all ends before too long. Stay safe.


EVENTS
I don't have any events going on over the next few months. Understandably they're all cancelled/postponed (as far as September/October). In lieu of this, I am focussing my time on making new work and on my online shops. 

NEW WORKS
Initially it hadn't felt like a very productive time for making new work, with the anxiety about the epidemic, but life has setting into a new routine and I've started making new work again.

Here are some of them:

Chough (3-colour linocut)

Pied Wagtail (2-colour linocut)

Tiny Donkey Prints

St Ives (2-colour linocut/screenprint)

  

Scarborough No.2 (poster-print)

'Chough' is my latest corvid print (following on from the ravens, rooks and magpies). I saw some when I last visited North Wales, swooping around the Little Orme. They're quite hard to identify, but if they stay still for a minute you can see their striking red beak and legs.

I spotted a 'Pied Wagtail' in our garden not long ago, and I don't think I'd ever actually seen one before. He/she was doing a little dance, and very striking in its monochrome pattern.


The Tiny Donkey Prints were made for a special project with the 'Make More Stuff' organisation (formerly 'Northern Craft'). they asked 20 artists they knew to design artwork the size of a business card, and they would sell them for £1 each. I created a new donkey triptych, and was very happy with the results. you can buy them directly through MMS.

I visited St Ives last year for the first time, and really loved the place. The highlight was perhaps visiting the Barbara Hepworth Museum, but I also really loved the sea front and the beaches. So I decided to create a view from the shallows looking up towards the town and the lighthouse, as a linocut/screen-print.

Lastly is a poster-print version of my 'Scarborough No.2' linocut. As the original had sold out I decided to create a poster-print version in different colours.

I have also been working on several other new pieces, possibly for a new exhibition (fingers crossed), but I want to keep them under wraps for now. I'll keep you posted!








WORKSHOPS
Obviously I'm not able to run any linocut workshops at the moment, and any scheduled ones have been postponed, but as soon as I'm able to start on them again I will post up new  dates.


COMMISSIONS
Just before the lock-down I was commissioned to produce a new logo for the Kelham Island Film Club in Sheffield.