Golden Plover

 Golden Plover

8 colour reduction linocut

190mm x 170mm

Newly completed linocut inspired by a recent walk across the moors at the head of the Calder Valley.

Field Work

 Drawings made on last Sundays trip out with Carly. Leaving the car at Widdop Gate on the Hebden Bridge to Colne road we walked up the Gorple track and skirted round Lower Gorple Reservoir then cut up the small valley to the ruined farm at Raistrick Greave before climbing on to the moor top by the medieval reaps cross before dropping back down to the car. Good numbers of Green Hairstreak Butterflies, Curlews everywhere and at least 5 pairs of Golden Plover on the moor top.

Green Hairstreak Butterfly, although almost all the individuals seen only had a few white dots rather than the full white hairstreak on the hind wing.

Raistrick Greave Farm, dating from around the mid 1600's and abandoned sometime around 1890 ish.

The medieval Reaps Cross, much repaired over the centuries and now missing it's cross pieces.

Reaps Cross and Golden Plovers flying passed. Lower Gorple reservoir in the middle ground and the watershed between the Calder and Aire Valleys on the horizon.

New Prints

 I have been working on a number of images all of which have over the last couple of days come to completion and been editioned.

Badger

Wood Engraving

30mm x 70mm

Golden Eagle 

Wood Engraving

23mm x 72mm

Sylvan Cathedral

Mezzotint

200mm x 300mm

Ink, Wipe, Print - Repeat

 Got up this morning and began to edition the new mezzotint. After around 7 hours working managed 10 impressions.

Two attempt and still can't take a decent photo of the print

3rd State

 I took two impressions this evening from the current mezzotint plate in progress. Ist impression at the top, 2nd at the bottom. Printed the 2nd impression with a little more pressure so combined with the better inking it's a crisper image, although you wouldn't believe that from the dodgy photo. Trust me it is. 

Almost there now just some tidying up to do in parts then it will be ready to edition and show at Art in the Pen in August.

Hawthorn Printmakers Charcoal Black ink. 

220gsm Fabriano Rosapina.

Image 200mm x 300mm

Editioning

 After working on the new plate all week, without really progressing it further. I realised I was just tinkering with it for tinkerings sake. So this morning I decided that enough is enough and set up to start printing. After around five hours work I'd taken 10 impressions.

Mezzotint - Progress or otherwise

 Work is going steadily away on the latest mezzotint with one small set back. I took my first impression from the plate back at the end of January. 

State 1 - Impression 1. Printed 22/01/23.

Overall the image is still dark with a long way to go yet but the main elements are defined and starting to take shape.

State 2 - Impression 1. Printed 04/02/23.

After more scraping the large foreground tree is more clearly defined but the sky areas between the tracery of branches still needs more scraping and burnishing. Fiddly work and time consuming but strangely meditative.

State 3 - Impression 1. Printed 12/02/23.

Overall more or less as I want it. There is still a lot of burnishing to do in the sky area and parts of the smaller twigs on the foreground tree need to be lightened. However, I'm not happy about the wall on the right hand side. I wanted a more dappled light effect on it but I've scraped too much, not left enough dark areas and now it just looks flat. After some thought I decided the only option was to re-rock that part of the plate and start again on the wall. A bit of a setback as I was hoping to have at least a decent artists proof printed ready to take to the North Wales Print Fair at the Mostyn Gallery in Llandudno next week.

New Year - New Work

 It's been a steady start to work since the New Year, with this mezzotint plate on the work bench. The bones of the design are roughed out but need more refining before taking a first impression. Another couple of days or so and we should be nearly there.

This sketch of a woodland track near my home drawn early last spring is the basis for the print. I've scanned it in to the computer, reversed it and printed it out below. This gives me an image to transfer to the copper plate.

Not the easiest object to photograph but the images below give an idea of the progress so far.

Signs of Industry

 All along the Calder Valley are signs of its industrial past. Some are obvious, the old mill buildings dating from the industrial revolution to older relics of the old cottage industries. Along the watercourses there are old overgrown mill leats and broken sluices the only remaining traces of industries long gone and now hidden by the overgrown tangle of reclaiming woodland.

The Old Sluice

Wood Engraving on Maple

100mm x 75mm

Edition of 20

The Dumb Steeple

 Another small wood engraving 55mm x 40mm on an oddly shaped sample block. Quite a test of composition. This is the Dumb Steeple at Cooper Bridge in the Calder Valley, close to where the River Colne joins the River Calder. Originally it stood in the centre of the crossroads where the road up the valley divides, one branch crosses the Calder and on to Huddersfield, whilst the main road continues up the Calder Valley. Now though it stands to one side, having been moved from its original spot when the roads were widened. In 1812 it was the rallying point for a group of Luddites prior to them marching on Rawfolds Mill in Liversedge a couple of miles over the hill from here.

Hitting a Wall

 It's been a bit of a frustrating month since our summer holiday. I've made two attempts at a linocut of the lighthouse at Spurn Head and both attempts have ended up in the bin. The first abandoned after about 5 colours and the second after two colour passes. I'll return to the subject and give it another go as there is definitely a print there but I need a couple of months distance, to come back to it with fresh eyes.

So in the meantime I've been playing around with my sample endgrain wood blocks and engraved a couple of little prints.

Towards Bacton Church

22mm x 76mm

Engraved on Lemonwood.

Based on a recent sketch made on the Norfolk coast, looking across the wheat fields from near Paston to the church in the village of Bacton.

The Te Deum Stone, Withens Gate, Calderdale.

45mm x 39mm

Engraved on Maple Wood.

An incised marker stone probably dating from the late medieval times which stands beside the packhorse route which crosses the moor between Mankinholes and Cragg Vale in the Calder Valley. The latin inscription; Te Deum Laudamus translates as "we praise thee O Lord."

Where Seven Streams Fall

Finally finished the platework on the new mezzotint and after two days editioning the plate I now have a stack of 20 impressions dried between blotting paper.

Where Seven Streams Fall

Mezzotint

200mm x 300mm

Edition of 20

This is Lumb Falls in Crimsworth Dene, a small valley which runs down off the moor to join the Calder Valley at Hebden Bridge. About 10 miles as the crow flies up the valley from where I am writing this. The bridge in the background (a worthy subject in it's own right) carries the old Packhorse Route from Burnley to Halifax across the beck.

Just before the First World War a group of local men sat on the rocks between the two waterfalls and posed for a photograph. Many years later the poet Ted Hughes came across the photo and wrote a poem called Six Young Men, a line from the poem gave me the idea for the title. The poem can be read in full here

The print is available from my on-line shop here

Back to the Mezzotint

After working on the mezzotint plate over the last week, I've taken another impression. Apart from a little more burnishing on the white water in the foreground I think that this is now ready to edition.

Mezzotint - 3rd State Impression 1. 200mm x 300mm.

2nd State Proof

After working the plate for a couple of weeks after taking the first proof I'm now ready to take a second. So I was up early this morning and got the inks out. Having only limited space in my studio I'm not able to have dedicated clean and inky areas so I have to be more careful with keeping things apart. My usual work bench serves also as my inking and wiping table. My hot plate sits on a portable table and my waterbath sits beside my press table.

Inked Plate ready for wiping

The wiped plate on the bed of the press

 State II - Impression I

Much more progress now from the first proof I took (see the previous post). As I suggested I wasn't happy with the drawing of the ferns on the right hand side so I re-rocked this part of the plate and redrew them. They still need some more work to highlight the areas catching the dappled sunlight but I am now more pleased with the way that they are looking. The mid-tones on the bridge and area above the waterfalls I am ok with. The main areas for further work are now just on the water. The white water of the falls needs to be burnished much more so that they print as white rather than the dirty grey that they appear. I'm also not sure what to do with the sky - leave it as it is or burnish it paler. Time to put it aside, go out and mow the lawn and then come back to it later with fresh eyes.

1st Proof

After working on the plate fairly solidly for around a week now I've brought it to the stage where I need to proof it. Whilst I prefer to take as few proofs as possible, I find it very hard to judge the state of progress by looking at the plate alone. I am sure that there are some areas which will need much more work but equally I feel that some parts of the plate, particularly in some of the mid tones may be close to being as I want them. So I inked up the plate and took one impression.

The plate, inked up on the press bed. At 20 x 30cm this is the largest size that I can work at on my press.

1st state impression 1.

Not bad, the photograph seems to show much more definition than the print actually has and the sky above the bridge looks paler than on the print. The water below the falls needs more work to vary the tones as it looks a bit flat at the moment. I'm not happy with the bracken on the right hand side and may re-rock this out and start again.

Progress

Difficult to get the camera angle right, I've done more work on the left hand fall than appears from these images. All the white areas are now roughed out although they need much more scraping and then burnishing so that they will print as white. With the lightest and the black areas worked out I can now work through the greys from these extremes. The plate size for this is 200mm x 300mm.

Lumb Falls

This week I've begun a new mezzotint print of Lumb Falls at the head of Crimsworth Dene near Hebden Bridge. Working from a sketch made at the end of last summer after a period of heavy rain which left the beck running in full spate.

My original watercolour field sketch is on the right. Using this and a photograph taken at the time I made a pencil drawing at the size of my plate (200mm x 300mm). I scanned this drawing and then reversed it before printing it out and transferred it onto the plate using typists carbon paper.

Now begins the long job of engraving, starting with the fiddly bits of sky showing through and around the trees at the top of the plate. Once this is done I'll move on to the white areas of foaming water on the falls themselves. These are the two lightest areas of the print and once I've established these I can work back to the darkest areas.

New Year and the last print of the old year.

Engraved in the days following Christmas and printed on New Years Eve this is my last print of the old year. Almost 40 years after I made my first, I've finally got around to making my second Wood Engraving.

Saxon Cross

Wood Engraving

127mm x 101mm

Edition of 20

Printed with black Litho ink on 220gsm Fabriano Rosapina paper.

Dating from around the 10th or 11th Century this Saxon wheel head cross stands on the edge of the Calder Valley high above Todmorden. It's location lies close to an ancient pathway and later pack horse route over the moors between Lancashire and Yorkshire.

New Mezzotint

Not really new as I've been working on this mezzotint plate since early January. As the plate is now nearing completion I have been experimenting with inking. This is printed with a 50% Lapis Blue Opaque and 50% Indigo mix, blending through 100% Indigo to a 50% Sap Green and 50% Indigo mix.

The Bride - completed

Printed a final subtle dark on the print, just to add some extra modelling into the shadows.

The Bride

17colour reduction linocut, printed in 12 stages.

212mm x 149mm

Edition of 18

Printed on Fabriano Rosapina.

This lump of weathered gritstone stands on Bridestones Moor overlooking the upper Calder Valley. It stands around 14ft high, 9ft across the top but only 2-3ft across the base.