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Lecture Demonstration: Japanese Ukiyoe Print Making with Motoharu Asaka and Louise Rouse

Asaka’s Print of Hokusai’s famous ‘The Great Wave’ originally c. 1831

University of Western England, 1st October 2015

Context 

 Ukiyoe woodblock carving and printing is a traditional method of print making that has been practised in Japan for more than 400 years. It is one of the most popular art forms in history but has failed to make the move into contemporary fine art print making. More modern print methods have made Ukiyoe unviable. The form has declined to the point where now there are only a few masters remaining, all aged 65 or older. The skills are not taught in the universities and the long, arduous technical apprenticeship is not attracting younger artisans into the fold.

Motoharu Asaka is one of these last remaining masters of this dying craft. To achieve the status of master woodblock carver he trained for 17 years and now has over 45 years of experience. He is able to carve 3 lines per millimetre and is the only woodcarver in Japan able to work at this level. He is one of only 3 practitioners still able to print Hokusai’s famous ‘The Great Wave’ image.

Motoharu Asaka demonstrating Ukiyoe skills

Traditionally the skills involved in ukiyoe were spread between 3 craftsmen; the painter (eshi), the carver (horishi) and the printer (surishi), all of whom operated under the auspices of the publisher who owned the blocks and the prints produced. Splitting the process enabled each practitioner to become highly skilled and efficient in their part and made it possible for runs of each image (once the blocks were carved) to be produced relatively swiftly, often in their thousands. They were inexpensive, expendable art works sold on street corners or in book shops and bought by ordinary folk of moderate means.

Getting to the point of printing the first print in a particular series was very time consuming particularly in terms of the carving. The wood was hard and the designs demanding making the work slow, difficult and tiring. In addition 10 to 25 blocks were produced per image. Very large print runs were necessary in order for the process to be economical.

More modern print methods that emerged in Japan during the last century with the  work of artists such as Yamamoto Kanae, placed less emphasis on technical rigour, operated with greater freedom of both process and expression and helped to make ukiyoe unviable. Animosity developed between the new creative print makers and the traditional ukiyoe print makers. This and the lack of understanding about the new form hindered its development.

‘Fisherman’ by Yamamoto Kanae 1904

It took until 1932 for the first modern print to be accepted into a nationally recognised exhibition and post world war II before universities had printmaking departments and the modern form became established through the work of artists such as Saito Kiyoshi.

‘Steady Gaze’ by Saito Kiyoshi 1950-55 

Ukiyoe Process

The painter creates the design which is then placed on the wooden block. Upper layers of the paper are then removed leaving only a fine covering of the design through which the carver works. He carves the outline of each shape and then creates a ‘moat’ beyond which larger areas are more readily removed before coming back to the more delicate business of removing the moat adjacent to the initial carved line.  

 Motoharu Asaka uses mountain cherry wood to make his blocks. This is a very hard wood which is difficult and tiring to work but enables fine detail and discourages breakage of small parts. The wood is dried for 10 years before being put to use and will last for thousands of prints. Once a carving has deteriorated beyond use a top layer of the block can be ground away and then the block can be reused for a new design.

Motoharu Asaka demonstrating Ukiyoe carving technique

The work is printed on to mulberry bark paper which is a very fine, strong, handmade paper able to resist the brutal burnishing as each layer of colour is added. The paper is made ready by placing between layers of damp newspaper, each layer being 24 sheets deep. 5 year old newsprint is used which is carefully dampened the night before use to allow it to stabalise providing even, controlled conditions for the mulberry bark paper.

Watered down watercolour paint is used in conjunction with starch glue which adheres the watercolour to the paper and helps to make the colour stronger on the paper. A block carved with the design’s line image is printed first and then each colour block is added beginning with the lightest and finishing with the darkest. 

Some Ukiyoe tools

The paint is applied with a paintbrush style brush but then worked into the block using a ‘hake’ brush which looks more like a shoe cleaning brush. Great skill is involved in the application of the paint and subtle, smooth gradients can be achieved. Sometimes the paint and then the paper is reapplied for a denser colour. Asaka demonstrated several different methods of applying the paint in order to achieve different gradient affects including ichimoji bokashi, a straight line gradient used in Hokusai’s ‘The Great Wave’. The block is first wet in order that the colour can bleed to the desired extent. 

Ichimoji bokashi gradient blending

The block has registration marks in one corner and to one side to enable the paper to be placed accurately for each layer. Asaka demonstrated the delicacy and concentration this required, carefully placing the paper adjacent to the marks and allowing it to fall on to the block whilst being held to the registration marks with this thumbs.

Block with registration marks bottom centre and right

The print is made by pressing the paper on to the block using a burnishing tool, or baten. The action required a lot of strength but also technique to achieve good results and avoid exhaustion. The baten was an expensive part of the ukiyoe kit created with coils of plaited grass, layers of fine paper and a covering of bamboo leaf.

Motoharu Asaka demonstrating the use of the baten in the making of a traditional Japanese ukiyoe print

You can spot a traditional hand print because the colour comes through to the other side of the paper, something that doesn’t happen with modern methods.

Front

Back

Work Ethic

Asaka has spent his life carving other people’s designs and has no desire to make his own original work. He prides himself on applying none of his own bias to the block and in fact prefers the work to look as if he was never a part of the process, a silent contributor. He may not invest his energies in personal expression but is none the less fully committed to the work and has devoted his entire life to this process.

“Whether I look right or left, eyes open or closed, I only think about carving.” Motoharu Asaka

His attention to detail, accuracy and perfection is rigorous and at times the process is physically demanding yet there is no sense of strain in the body or mind.

“I approach the wood in a relaxed way. It’s a bit like learning to drive, after a while the tension goes. “ Motoharu Asaka 

The repetitive nature of the tasks had a calm sequence to them that was almost ceremonial and meditative.

 “There are no formal rituals associated with Ukiyoe but there is a rhythm and efficiency to the movement which is almost a ritual in itself. I have to be centred and in the moment to do it well.”  Motoharu Asaka 

Based on personal notes taken at the Louise Rouse lecture and the Motoharu Asaka demonstrations at the University of Western England 1/10/2015 

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Lecture: Laura Thomas

Chromoscope 2008

Hereford College of Arts, 15th January 2015

Laura Thomas is an established woven textile artist and designer specialising in producing textile artworks for public spaces,corporate environments, exhibitions and private homes. She works to commission and sells through a number of galleries.

Thread Landscape at Garn Lake 2008 for Torfaen Public Art

Laura is also a commercial home furnishings textile designerwith clients including Inch Blue, John Lewis Partnership, Heals and Osborne and Little. She also curates and teaches.

Bird baby blanket for Inch Blue 2007

   Symmetree design for Heals 2011

Laura is best known for her ‘Resonate’ collection of vivid cotton, silk and Lurex threads encapsulated in acrylic resin, creating freestanding sculptural objects or wall panels.

 Spine 2008

  The Resonate work grew out of her determination to push the expected boundaries of woven textiles challenging the notion that textiles are two dimensional and reinterpreting the meaning of warp and weft. Structurally integral relief pleats, folds, loops and ruches can be found in much of her work and her fascination with the construction of cloth is a key characteristic of her artworks.

Lattice 2009

Arc 2010

As a woven textile artist and designer Laura has always been deeply inspired by the unwoven warp threads on a loom and likes to capture the visual impact of the warp: its linear qualities and the optical mixing of pure colour in that moment in time before the warp is tensioned to begin weaving.

  Loose Treads: Red into Orange 2005

Window commission, The Beanery, Canterbury 

Laura always demonstrated an ordered methodical way of thinking even from her school days and whilst exploring different textile disciplines as part of her degree at the University of Central England it was weave that she found a natural affinity for. She loved to explore colour, line and proportion through the constructed cloth and developed a fascination for fabric. The medium leant itself to her love of strong colour and geometry. Since graduating in 1999 Laura has completed an MA at The Royal College of Art and a fellowship with the Ann Sutton Foundation.

Laura Thomas studio

  Meadow Grasses Olive Strip jacquard sketch 2007

In 2013 Laura returned to Wales and set up her studio in the centre of Cardiff where she produces hand-woven fabrics on her 24 shaft computer-driven AVL loom. She also has jacquard fabrics in her portfolio which have been produced at the RCA or in limited quantities by UK mills. Laura received funding and worked collaboratively with Hafod Grange Ltd to explore encapsulating materials in resin. Initially she used a polyester resin (as can be seen in National Trust paper weights) but moved on to acrylic resin for the superior optical quality and increased robustness. The process needs specialist facilities particularly in terms of fume extraction so is not carried out in her own studio but outsourced. She predominantly uses silk, cotton and linen, brightly dyed yarns (not hand dyed) often using light reflective yarns. The outcome created wonderful internal reflections that played with light and angles to great visual effect. The work has leant itself well to the creation of awards where Laura adds laser etching onto the acrylic exterior.

Cardiff Design Festival Award

Ashes Vessel 2009

  The Ashes Vessel 2009 was a commission. The spin and twist of the yarn relates to the spin and twist of the ball in cricket. Laura often uses the opportunity of a commission to move her practice forward and this was such an example. The bulk of Laura’s work is now in the realm of public art and commissions. She particularly relishes the opportunity to work large scale with architecture design teams.

Llanelli glass canopy

Having explored the use of resin in my own work I found Laura's Resonate pieces particularly relevant. In my case I was interested in the notion of how we try to capture memories and hold them safe by encapsulating them in photographs or keepsakes and yet despite our best efforts memories remain beyond our grasp. I also found resin useful to facilitate the transparent, layered nature of memory, how we see through one to another with the accumulation of experience.

Julie Leach - Memory 2014

  www.laurathomas.co.uk

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Winter's Bare Essentials

Using Photoshop to explore my own photographs of flora forms found amongst the January chill.

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Sketchbook practice: seedhead

A momentary glance. Line and shape outlined against a wintry sky. Clarity of vision, unimpaired by the clutter of surrounding growth.

Exploring the organic form through the printed mark ...... emphasizing the angularity of the lines and shapes.

Exploring the organic form through the handmade mark ...... emphasizing the flow of the lines and shapes

Each method promoting its own dynamic - angle vs curve, smooth and flowing vs choppy and dislocated ......

......... and exaggerating that dynamic towards abstraction.

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Morning Mists

Early morning meanderings in the bitter chill of January. Sunlight attempting but failing to make its presence felt through the shifting mist. Branches making intricate traces, cobweb like across the grey sky-scape.

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Charleston Revisited

Like ghosts disturbed, Bloomsbury won't leave me alone and I am drawn back to Charleston ....

..... to explore paint colours and techniques used by Vanessa Bell and Duncan Grant. Gestural daubs and free sweeps of paint.

Re-creating designs on door panels and cushion covers.

Playing with their textile designs - 'White' by Vanessa, 'Clouds' by Duncan.

Copying their motifs from fire surrounds, furniture and window panels.

Feeling their presence through old black and white photographs of members of the group ........

..... and the things they said that have never been forgotten .....

"Art is a passion or it is nothing." Roger Fry

The gloom of that October afternoon in the garden at Charleston .....

..... brought together in a jigsaw of images and text on paper.

Then and now, different layers of time and meanings on textiles.

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5 Point Wonder: Mary Quant

Credited with inventing the miniskirt and hot pants but also famous for plastic knee-high boots, shiny plastic raincoats, boxy shift dresses, pinafore dresses, clingy knits and patterned tights. Her clothes were made up of simple shapes combined with strong colours.

Opened Bazaar, her first clothing shop, on the Kings Road in 1955, a second Bazaar in Knightsbridge in 1961 and by 1963 was exporting to the USA going into mass production to keep up with demand and becoming a worldwide brand.

Eventually expanded into home goods, make up and accessories and launched the Ginger Group, a lower priced line designed to appeal to an even wider clientele whilst always remaining true to her mod roots.

  Believed in freedom and individuality, seeing fashion as a mode of personal expression and a way a constantly renewing who you are. Developed make-up as a way of bringing fashion to the face and developing an all-over coordination.

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Trekking the Textile Trail in London (Part 2)

Annely Juda Fine Art, The Photographers Gallery, Liberty, and The V&A Museum were just a few of the ports of call on this two day textile extravaganza in London. Here are some highlights:-

Annely Juda Fine Art - Dering Street

Alan Green Exhibition

Alan Green was a British abstract painter who aimed to produce unemotional work in which colour and how it was applied dictated the form of the work. This exhibition included 10 late paintings from 1991 to 2002 and 23 drawings.

The work was intriguing for a student in the midst of a mark making module. Alan marked his canvases with stencils, combs and brushes creating textures, shapes and lines where the physical process of making could be clearly seen in the outcome.

I love the carefree vitality in this section of drawing above and the simple accessibility of the marks below.

I love the pattern of this large work below (Lattice 2001 - oil on linen - 90 x 250 cm).  

Alan said he wanted to create “ordinary paintings as ordinary as the real world” and there was a straight forward honesty about his work, his materials and his processes that was true to this aspiration. I found many of his ideas inspiring both for drawing and textile design.

The Photographer's Gallery - Ramillies Street

Edward Steichen: In High Fashion, The Conde Nast Years 1923-1937 

It was fortuitous to catch this exhibition of over 200 vintage prints by Edward Steichen (1879 – 1973) whose work for Vogue and Vanity Fair in the 1920s and 30s revolutionised fashion photography and established Steichen as the most famous and highest paid portrait photographer of his time. He is known as the father of modern fashion photography and defined the couture of his time through his portraits of iconic figures in politics, literature, journalism, dance, theatre and sport.

Photograph of actress Gloria Swanson in Vanity Fair 1924 by Edward Steichen

Currently studying haute-couture from this period it was fascinating to see the work of Patou, Poiret, Chanel and Schiaparelli captured with such dramatic orchestration of light and shadow. It brought the gowns and textiles researched in books and online to life, set in the context of the period for which they were created.

  Joan Crawford in a gown by Schiaparelli photographed by Edward Stricken in 1932

It was equally fascinating to see his portraits of iconic figures of the time such as Martha Graham, Fred Astaire, Winston Churchill and Greta Garbo.

Fred Astaire in Top Hat 1927

Steichen was in the right place at the right time in a role that allowed his innovative thinking to develop and have huge impact on the development of 20th century photography and fashion. In a pre-television era he understood and capitalised on the ‘media’ of the moment.

Liberty's

Liberty's was round the corner, a source of potentially endless textile indulgence.

I bypassed the traditional Liberty cotton lawn florals in favour of design which oozed spontaneity and celebrated mark making; bluebellgray and Boheme.

Bluebellgray

 Bluebellgray is the brain child of Scottish designer Fi Douglas who launched the brand in 2009 and a year later had already been shortlisted for the Elle Decoration Design Award. Fi is a fine art and textiles graduate of the Glasgow School of Art. She has a great love of colour and flowers that she captures with watercolours in a painterly manner. Every nuance of brush and pigment is captured in the printing process creating immediacy and a relaxed liveliness in the outcome. No small scale repeats here but big, bold immersive designs which bring a contemporary freshness to floral textiles. Fi isn't only an artist, she has a highly successful business model with work in stores all over the world including John Lewis as well as Liberty here in the UK and now employs designers, studio assistant and PR staff. Inspiring!

Visit http://www.bluebellgray.com/about-bluebellgray/  to see Bluebellgray's upbeat video that communicates the essence of Fi's work so well.

Boeme

Like Bluebellgray, Boeme Design is based on the fine art paintings of the founder Jo Bound who started the business in 2011 and already has work in stores all over the globe including Heals and Liberty.

The natural world provides inspiration for both designers. For Fi it is primarily flowers and for Jo it is the landscape around her home in Guildford, Surrey as well as Lancashire where she hails from and the Lake District. 

The similarity continues in Jo's love for painting, colour and bold pattern, large scale designs that push the boundaries of traditional textile design, using processes that translate the physical painterly mark into digital print. Her stand out designs are those where the free flowing gesture of the designer can be seen in the print as in the Bonito fabric below and her Panorama fabric above. Jo is currently interested in extending her range of furniture upholstered in her highly original fabrics through collaboration with a furniture designer.

Many of Boeme fabrics and especially their cushions are printed on velvet, a fabric which gives the range a sumptuous sense of luxury.

The V&A

The Victoria and Albert Museum was our final port of call and I have to admit to being somewhat exhausted by this point. I can highly recommend the café!

It was spine tingling though to see some Omega Workshop textiles in the flesh including 'White' 1913 (centre) credited to Vanessa Bell, Amenophis 1913 (top) and Margery 1913 (bottom) both credited to Roger Fry, the founder of the workshops.

Fry brought together a group of artists to design furniture, pottery, glass, textiles and entire schemes of interior decoration. Their radically abstract style, typified by these textiles, was far ahead of its time and was influenced by developments in contemporary painting.

Where this has resonance with the contemporary textiles by Boeme and Bluebellgray seen at Liberty's was Fry's belief that designs should not be too mechanical and should show evidence of the artist's hand. The printers are said to have used a secret process to 'preserve the freedom and spontaneity of the original drawing'. Designers 100 years apart but sharng the same quest in their work.

'White' was possibly named after the suffragette Amber Blanco-White, who rented a room at the top of the Omega Workshops building in Fitzroy Square. It was the fabric Vanessa Bell chose to hang at her bedroom window at her Charleston home near Lewes.

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Trekking the Textile Trail in London (Part 1)

Monmouth Street off Covent Garden, The National Gallery, and The Cloth House on Berwick Street were just a few of the ports of call on this two day textile extravaganza in London. Here are some highlights:-

Orla Kiely

If you missed the sign you would be left in no doubt as to where you were as soon as you crossed the threshold for there, ingrained into the floor, was Orla's iconic 'stem' design.

Orla Kiely is an Irish contemporary designer known for her unique retro prints and designs. She has shops in Monmouth Street and The Kings Road in London and also in New York as well as selling through other outlets such as John Lewis. She has her own on-line shop selling products for interiors, stationery, clothing, accessories and handbags including her famous oil cloth bags whose innovation was the foundation of her success.

Orla is renowned for her distinctive colour palette of orange, olive green and blue grey and for her botanical motifs.

"A lot of my inspiration comes from interiors and home and vintage finds. I always love yellow, but it’s about different tones working together and I often use brown, sometimes you need that to ground it." (Orla Kiely - http://www.lifestyleetc.co.uk/2012/12/06/the-world-according-to-orla-kiely/)

Seriously tempted by her stack of stem bath towels .......

.... or the simple, strong design of these note-cards.

http://www.orlakiely.com/uk/

Gudrun Sjoden

Also on Monmouth Street is Swedish designer Gudrun Sjoden's only shop in the UK.

Looking into her shop windows gave me a similar feeling to that experienced at an exhibition of Kaffe Fassett's work. Her colours are really intense, largely undiluted by white or black, and used in similar combinations with areas of the shop devoted to blues, greens, turquoises and others to reds, pinks and oranges. The whole effect is made all the more powerful by the indulgence of pattern. Not the clean sophistication of Kiely here but typically Scandinavian with a whole hearted connection to nature in full bloom.

Gudrun's designs were pinned casually on the walls ......

... and shown effectively in lampshades ....

.....bedding....

.. and other interior textiles in addition to the clothing.

Gudrun says that "Nature is my power" (http://www.gudrunsjoden.com/) and this is clearly evident in her work, as is her Nordic heritage. From her first collection to her now international success Gudrun celebrates 50 years in business this year. "I love clothes with strong colour and individuality that signal a certain kind of lifestyle,”  (http://www.theguardian.com/gudrun-sjoden-winter/2014) and that style is joyful, practical and comfortable, guaranteed to give you a boost whatever the weather.

The National Gallery

Maggi Hambling - Walls of Water

Powerful and dramatic these 8 sea paintings (6 x 7 feet) are enveloping, you can almost hear the sound of the crashing waves. Famous for her monumental 'Scallop' sculpture (2003) on Aldeburgh beach this, by contrast, is about movement and energy.

What interested me was her strong, gestural mark making with the paint and how this was brought together to create such impact and meaning.

(http://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/whats-on/exhibitions/maggi-hambling-walls-of-water)

Berwick Street

This street in the famous Soho area of London has long been synonymous with fashion and the textile industry. A long time ago it used to be a series of cheap dress shops selling at a fraction of the price of Oxford Street. In the 1970s, 80s and 90s it became famous for exotic fabrics and theatrical costume makers as well as traditional tailoring. It retains this identity to the present day with fabric and haberdashery shops such as The Cloth House, Misan Fabrics, the Berwick Street Cloth Shop and more.

The Cloth House

I particularly enjoyed the brilliantly displayed Cloth House, spread across 2 premises on different parts of the street. The first sells more technical materials including plastics and tyvek (a synthetic flash-spun, high-density polyethylene fibre) amongst others ....

.... and the other is completely dedicated to cotton, linen, natural and handmade fabrics, from all over the world and supplied in collaboration with local artisans supporting traditional crafts. 

There was also a very different and interesting haberdashery.

It was a real treasure trove, a great find and somewhere I shall no doubt return to.

https://www.clothhouse.com/

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Screen Printing from Photographs

The key to developing a good screen print from a photograph is to work with high contrast images, avoiding grey scale and maximising the areas of intense black or white.

Keeping with our on going plant theme I decided on using some photos of seed heads taken during my recent visit to Charleston House near Lewes. The plants have a distinctive structure with contrasts of lines and circles and in order to see this clearly I had taken the photo from beneath the plant so that they were silhouetted against the sky, uncluttered by other things.

I worked from a number of photographs cropping areas of interest and increasing the contrast in Photoshop using the levels, brightness and contrast tools.

I played with different arrangements of my cropped sections but decided on 5 oblongs crops placed adjacent to one another in a row.

In retrospect it might have been interesting to leave spaces between the oblongs creating a pentaptych although I do like the way the interruptions to the image make it unpredictable and demand more of the observer.

I printed the image on to acetate and prepared a screen with photo emulsion.

The acetate was then temporarily fixed to the emulsioned screen and placed in the UV bed where it was exposed for 30 seconds. I then removed the acetate and power hosed the screen. The areas that had been black on the acetate washed away and the white areas remained, blocking the screen.

My first print used opaque white binder with olive green dye. I was wanting to capture the moody, mistiness I had felt in the garden that evening. The green achieved this subtlety but I would have preferred a darker background. I didn't have time to do this in the workshop so played with a photo of the print in Photoshop afterwards.

I prefer both of the Photoshop versions and would like to go back and explore further with different backgrounds.

I also explored putting the grey green over a plain pearl binder background from another stencil cut print I had been playing with.

Overly complicated but it did create a sense of foreground and background which would be another idea to experiment further with.

With layering in mind I did a further print with a second layer using opaque white binder and blue grey dye, rotating the screen 180 degrees.

Once again I preferred it with a coloured background achieved in Photoshop playing with contrast and hue.

This print moves more towards a pure flat design and away from the simpler representation of the plant in the earlier prints. I like the added dimension of another colour and how the eye looks through one layer to another.

The composition of a row of oblongs inspired me to play with lengthening the image by repeat printing the images side by side to create a frieze. I decided to experiment this time with stronger contrasts of colour using standard transparent binder firstly with blue grey dye and secondly with orange dye.

I played on paper with different off sets of the second image, sometimes creating just a slight echo .......

...  and at other times shifting by half an oblong so that more of each layer could be seen, which I thought worked better.

The prints on fabric used a brighter orange than the more terracotta red I had used on the paper versions. I loved the contrast of the navy blue and the burnt orange ......

.... and the random patterns that occurred in close ups.

Still in search of a darker background I played with one of these new prints in Photoshop, inverting the image and changing the hue and saturation .....

I liked this final outcome because both the complexity of the double layered image, the dark background and the subtlety of the colours were in keeping with my initial intention of capturing a sense of the wintry plant silhouettes in the gloom of evening.

As a process, using photographs of plants has been a great stamping ground for new creative experiments. The process is a very useful one when dealing with complex imagery that would be difficult to achieve with a cut stencil or when wanting to work directly from the source material without drawing. I liked the way even fine details were captured and the real organic nature of the pattern wasn't compromised.

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Jane Bowler Lecture

Friday 28th November 2014 - Hereford College of Arts

"Mistakes are often the things that work out the best." Jane Bowler

Ground breaking use of new materials - innovative sculptural forms        

Jane Bowler is a London based fashion designer operating at the cutting edge. She is renowned for her constant exploration and discovery of new and exciting materials, a practice that has grown out of her interest in under-used recyclables such as old shower curtains and rubber. Contrary to many designers she is not inspired by visuals but by the materials themselves and by what can evolve through the process of manipulating them.

"I wanted the materials to speak for themselves and therefore wanted to work with really simple garment shapes." Jane Bowler

Her work is very sculptural ........

..........  often using geometric motifs.

Fringing is a key element, something that developed accidentally from experiments into heat pressing plastic shower curtains over moulded rubber.

She likes to combine natural fibres with the plastics for example in her Spring Summer 2012 collection 'Fall From Grace' (based on the story of Icarus) she uses cotton knitwear in conjunction with plastic feathers, working in collaboration with knitwear designer Heather Orr.

Accessories are developed linked to each collection and are sold via Jane's on-line shop. Being time consuming to research, develop and construct most of her work is beyond the reach of most people but the accessories provide a way for people to buy into the brand without inordinate expense.

Necklace - hand printed pvc, hand cut and hand constructed 

Having really over the top show pieces in each collection helps get Jane's work seen in fashion magazines, photo shoots, music videos and promotes the band particularly to celebratory and performance clients.

GQ Magazine

Ellie Goulding/ Glamour Magazine

PR agency Bloody Gray represent Jane and her work:

"We work with designers on all aspects of their business, developing them into balanced, working businesses and offering insight, advice and motivation to prepare them for the realities of the industry."

Jane says that she is still trying to figure out where she fits in the market and her collections over the last few years have included everything from the avant-garde to more toned down wearable versions. It is perhaps significant that with more and more celebrities buying into the brand her forthcoming spring/summer 2015 collection makes no compromises towards the more wearable end of the market.

Jane is carving a unique niche for herself in the UK and international fashion market with stores in LA, Hong Kong, Milan and Tokyo selling her work. With no formal fashion training this is perhaps surprising although maybe her 'artist' rather than 'designer' attitude is setting her apart in a world awash with competitive fashion creatives.

http://www.janebowler.co.uk/

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Combined Processes

Procion dye, cut stencil and grain mark resist screen printing

This session provided an opportunity to consolidate learning in terms of processes and at the same time experiment further by exploring what might be possible if these processes were used together rather than separately.

Each process offered a different characteristic to the mix:-

Procion dye - the spontaneity of marks applied by hand directly to the screen

Cut acetate stencil - pre-meditated marks often providing larger and less detailed areas of flat colour

Grain mark resist - pre-meditated marks capable of linear and tonal detail

I had been exploring the work of Tessa Pearson ......

Large Pink Selsey Flower by Tessa Pearson 

... and taking inspiration from highly coloured flowers that I photographed in my garden last summer.

I had done a series of large scale drawings as a result.

My A1 flower painting - watercolour and chalk pastel

This drawing and others had begun quite complex and by selecting sections and scaling up I had arrived at a simpler image.

A1 simplified drawing using acrylic and chalk pastel

In the process I had been experimenting with large, gestural marks, often containing an arc, that I felt could inject movement and energy into the image .....

.... and also marks where I felt the 'mark of the maker' was prominent and could lend a sense of spontaneity.

With these qualities in mind I decided to approach the 3 layers as follows:-

Layer 1 - procion dye - spontaneous gestural arcs across the screen with a large brush leaving the bristle marks showing where possible - blue tones

Layer 2 - cut acetate stencil - large flat area of leaf/stalk - bright lime

Layer 3 - grain mark resist - flower petals, and stamens adding detail and also leaving the brush marks showing - bright orange and pink

Unfortunately I don't have a photograph of layer 1 although the image at the top of the blog entry shows the procion dye marks clearly in the background. I did two prints at this stage, the second one being considerably paler.

I then cut the acetate stencil for layer 2 ......

and prepared the grain mark resist film for layer 3.

This was done using black acrylic applied with a brush for the separate petals and with a finger tip for the circles in the flower centre. Black ink pen was used for the criss cross marks in the flower centre. The daisy flowers were done with oil pastel scraped through with a skewer to add some fine detail.

Final print on white cotton.

Pigments and binders:-

Layer 1 - procion dye turquoise and electric blue undiluted

Layer 2 - standard binder with own mix of dye using emerald green and lemon yellow

Layer 3 - standard binder with orange (existing stock) and standard binder with deep pink (existing stock) alternated across the screen and pulled across together

Second print over paler Procion dye background

Additional print on card without layer 1

Detail showing the gestural arcs and overt brush marks aimed at creating movement and spontaneity.

Detail showing flower detail achieved by grain mark resist - scratching through black oil pastel.

I think the piece was successful in creating a lively print that captures a sense of spontaneity and movement. It relates well to the original intention inspired by Tessa Pearson and the garden flowers photograph. I like the way that the Procion dye arc brush marks show through the standard transparent binder and thus provides a continuity of flow across the work. If I was to do it again I might simplify the final layer. I actually think the flower bottom right, where the detailed marks didn't show through, is more effective than the detailed one top left. Although the oil pastel scratch marks were effective in their own right I think they over complicate this particular print which might work better by limiting the detail to the brush marks only and keeping the rest as large areas of flat colour.

A fun and interesting bit of research and development.

[julieleach-blog]

Hereford Contemporary Craft Fair 2014

14th - 16th November 2014 - The Courtyard, Hereford

Hereford Contemporary Craft Fair showcases the creative talent of 60 carefully selected designer makers.

It gives visitors the opportunity to meet the makers, buy or commission work or simply absorb and enjoy the varied, high quality work on show. For the designer makers the show gives them the chance to raise their profile within an elite group, sell work, network and get direct feedback from the public.

Here are some highlights from my visit.

With textile artist Dionne Swift on her stand at the show - http://www.dionneswift.co.uk/

Dionne Swift is a highly experienced textile artist who presents her work and her business with supreme professionalism. Having studied for an embroidery degree at Goldsmiths and an MA at the University of Central England she now uses printing, dying,stitching, felting and devore to produce a range of work including 2D art pieces, interior and fashion items. She sells direct from her highly organised, clean looking website but also has work in many galleries up and down the country.

It was definitely Dionne's mark making that drew me in. Confident, large scale, gestural, it had considerable connections to my own work and our current student drawing project. Her work is based on drawings of the landscape particularly of Yorkshire where she is based.

"I walk, respond; record through thoughts and images and then back in the studio I develop further drawings. Heavily stitched pieces develop from the speed and energy of my mark making." Dionne Swift 

Wessenden Stitched by Dionne Swift 25 x 25 cm

I really enjoyed Dionne's drawings, they exuded energy and I particularly liked the more abstract ones, some of which combined stitch with her drawing media.

Image from http://www.textileartist.org/dionne-swift/

I also liked her high quality, fine wool, hand painted scarves which were also based on landscape drawings. As a scarf, the landscape became abstracted in the process of wearing as the marks are interrupted and juxtaposed.  

"I’ve travelled through a series of differing media and techniques but the work has remained rooted in a sense of drawing and mark making." Dionne Swift

Other artists whose work interested me included:- 

Ben Esthop's hardwood vessels fused with synthetics - http://esthop.com/

Esther Lord's handmade contemporary silverware and jewellery - http://www.estherlord.com/

Ken Eardley's hand built, functional ceramics decorated with hand cut stencils - keneardley@hotmail.com

I could list many more such was the breadth and depth of talent and high class work on show at this event. It was a delight to be able to meet so many designer makers in one place and to talk to them personally about their practice. It was educational, inspiring and hugely enjoyable.

[julieleach-blog]

Alternative Approaches to Drawing

Memory Drawing, Blind Drawing, Continuous Line Drawing and Drawing with a stick

Matisse drawing with a bamboo pole tipped with charcoal 1948

"No drawing is wrong, every drawing is valid, drawing is simply informative." Eli Greenacre

Designed, maybe, as a loosening up exercise and to try to liberate us all from the tyranny of representational accuracy, we were set a series of tasks that took us out of our normal way of drawing.

1. Look at the flower for 30 seconds Without looking at the flower again, draw from memory – 2 minutes

2. Look at the flower for 1 minute. Draw from memory – 5 minutes

3. Look at the flower – NOT at the page at all! Place your pen/pencil on the page and DO NOT remove it until the drawing is finished. Now, just looking at the flower, trace what you see on the page – remember don’t look at the page until you are finished. – 1 minute

4. Now fill a large sheet of paper with a range of Blind Drawings in a range of scales - 10 minutes

5. Now draw a LARGE scale blind drawing of the flower, filling the sheet - 3 minutes

6. Start to introduce different materials now -  pens/pencils/pastels/charcoal/paints/inks Fill 2 sheets with Blind Drawings in different materials and at different scales

1. felt pen          2. charcoal          3. graphite pencil

4. ink from pipette          5. brush and paint          6. biro

7. Attach a marker pen or charcoal to the end of a stick using masking tape. Place a large sheet of paper on the easel/wall/floor Using the stick, do a series of Blind and Observational Drawings focusing on movement and fluidity in the drawing. Complete a minimum of 4 sheets of ‘stick’ drawings.

Large scale blind drawing focussing on movement and fluidity - felt pen on the end of a stick

Large scale drawing focussing on movement and fluidity- charcoal on the end of a stick

Large scale drawing focussing on movement and fluidity - black oil pastel on the end of a stick

Large scale drawing focussing on movement and fluidity - black marker pen on the end of a stick

Large scale drawing focussing on movement and fluidity - black marker pen on the end of a stick

Large scale drawing focussing on movement and fluidity - brush and black paint on the end of a stick.

As we went through our directed tasks of looking, then drawing from memory, then looking again and drawing from memory again, it became obvious to me how little I was remembering even though I thought I had been looking with concentration. I couldn't remember much and so when drawing from memory I fell back on cliche, old short cuts, my own established schema.

Detail from stick painting above

By complete contrast, when I did the blind drawing, where I had to look at the flower all the time and not look at the page at all, I noticed everything, so much visual information. It felt irrelevant whether the blind marks on the page made any sense or not because what was important was to use the drawing as a tool to understand the flower visually.

As the exercise unfolded I felt myself becoming more and more of an expert on the flower I had chosen to work from, getting an angle right, the texture of the flower head or the overlap of a leaf. This had been arrived at, not through painful, painstaking, tight drawing but through repeated looking and free flowing mark making.

By the time we came to the larger drawings, focussing on movement and fluidity, I felt I had the information and could let rip with the mark making without reverting to stereotype. As artist Angie Lewin says "I don't use short cuts." Now I can understand what she means.

[julieleach-blog]

Stencil Cut Screen Printing

Stencil cut screen printing is a method of creating an image on paper, fabric or some other object by pressing ink through a screen with areas blocked off by a stencil.

The stencil can be made of paper but may only last for one or a small number of prints. An acetate stencil can be washed and reused enabling a greater number of prints and versatility in how it is used.

The demonstration drew our attention to the potential of this method to create large, smooth areas of block colour, to build layers of colour over the top of one another and to repeat print the stencil with small or large shifts of position. You could also use more than one stencil building different elements into a design. Keeping the off cuts from making the stencil can be useful to add to the design or to make specific additions such as hole punched spots of acetate.

Two recent experiences fed into my design for this workshop. Firstly I had been looking at the work of Patrick Heron, in particular one of his line and shape paintings 'Harbour window with two figures' 1950. 

'Harbour window with two figures' by Patrick Heron 1950 

The technique gave no attention to perspective, but placed all objects on a flat plane with lines passing through one another so you couldn't work out what was in front or behind. The result created an interesting design. This had led me to play with the same process with reference to plants.

Plant painting based on aspects of Patrick Heron's work above

I cut a stencil based on one half of this image.

Cut stencil based on painting above

The intricacy of the stencil felt readily achieved coming shortly after my second relevant experience - a paper cutting workshop with artist Maddie Parker. Through this work I had come to understand how a stencil of this type could hold together creating clear and blocked areas of design.

Layered paper cut resulting from the Maddie Parker workshop

Maddie had also encouraged us to play with layering which became relevant later when I started to repeat print with the stencil.

I began with a straight forward print of the stencil using standard binder mixed with navy grey dye. 

Despite the complexity of the stencil I think this image has a simplicity and strength derived from the contrast of the solid block navy colour and the clean, white interconnecting lines interrupting the space. I printed it twice so I had one to play further with. I also made a monoprint by removing the stencil from the screen and printing the reverse surface on to a fresh piece of paper.

This wasn't as sharp as the positive image above but the texture created where fractional patches of white show through the navy gave it a hand-made quality that would work well on a print for the wall or a greeting card whilst the first image would work well on fabric for interiors I think.

Having washed the stencil and screen I applied a second layer using standard binder and yellow ochre but shifting the screen slightly.

It's potentially an interesting effect but deemed less so by the use of a semi-transparent binder which has allowed the navy to show through the yellow ochre. I think it would have been more effective to have used opaque matt binder for this second layer so that the contrast between the yellow ochre, white and navy were more dramatic. I printed the screen twice so that I had one to play further with and also did a mono print with the reverse of the stencil ready to do a layered mono print.

This time I used the opaque matt binder but combined with a mid grey and instead of shifting the screen slightly I completely turned it round 180 degrees so that the design layers didn't line up at all.

This felt very 'Maddie Parker'! I like the complexity of the yellow ochre and white pattern showing through the matt, flat grey and the colour combination felt quite tasteful. I immediately layered the grey monoprint over the yellow ochre.

This was a simple process creating effective layered patterning. It gives you a sense of a depth of foliage like in a jungle or a dense part of a garden border as oppose to the flat pattern feeling created with two layers of the positive image above.

I wondered what would happen if I spiced the colours up so washed the screen and stencil and repeated the above process using first opaque matt binder with engine red and then opaque matt binder with black.

The first, positive image is quite dramatic but I don't like the second one at all. The addition of the white makes the image feel aggressive and lacking refinement. The monoprint worked out better although the colour is richer than portrayed here.

It was fun being able to create so much work in a short period of time and to be able to explore so many variations relatively easily. I was interested to discover ways of creating both flat block imagery on the one hand and also textured imagery with some depth, both from the same stencil and equipment.

I would like to go on to explore making and working with a stencil that isn't all connected in one rectangle, making separate stencil cut motifs to move around, make different arrangements with, break the rectangle and maybe overlay to create a different type of experience of this method.

[julieleach-blog]

Hanny Newton Lecture

Hanny Newton is passionate about hand embroidery and about exploring the possibilities this craft form holds for use in contemporary art.

Trained at the Royal School of Needlework, and at Falmouth University she now focusses on goldwork and whitework whilst pushing the boundaries of these traditional stitch techniques.

Hanny gave an excellent lecture about the history of goldwork embroidery, her own work and that of some of her contemporaries followed by a practical workshop.

Goldwork is the art of embroidery using metal threads often spun around cotton thread. It is used on the surface of the cloth and held in place with couching stitches. It has a long history going back over 2000 years and was traditionally associated with church vestments, hangings and royalty.

Interesting though the background of the craft was, it was Hanny's own work that interested me more and particularly her 'In Our Veins' fine art application. 

'In Our Veins' 2014

This work consisted of a collection of hand stitched and hand sculpted felt rocks using a development of the felt padding used in traditional goldwork but upscaled and reimagined using industrial felt. The piece was inspired by the landscape and mining heritage of Cornwall. The use of tin and copper thread (rather than gold and silver) used as part of three dimensional form  and applied to the story of working people instead of the elite represented a huge leap both in terms of processes and concept.

Other work by Hanny Newton:-

'Gold and Leather Map' from a series of works based on maps of the East End of London from the time of her grandmother's childhood, before the destruction of the area in the blitz.

'Copper and Tin Bow Tie' - one of a selection of designs where Hanny uses the bow tie as a contemporary platform for traditional stitich.

'Mark of the Maker' - created in response to the time, effort and passion of the unseen craftspeople who created artworks for Truro Cathedral. Hand embroidered with real silver thread and the artists own hair, this piece celebrates the devotional nature of crafts such as embroidery, where the maker puts something of themselves into the work with every stitch. This embroidery took around 130 hours to complete.

 Hanny also introduced us to the work of several other contemporary embroiderers:-

High class corporate logos by Charlotte Bailey

Georgina Bellamy - not afraid to break traditional embroidery rules working with unexpected materials in her own way

Embroidered bear by Karen Nicol

Tilleke Sxhwarz - 100% Checked, 2005, 67 x 60 cm

  Student workshop with Hanny Newton

The L4 students who took part in this workshop clearly enjoyed it immensely and got a lot out of it. As much as I'm always keen to try new things I don't think this would have been my thing. It was intricate, small scale and time consuming. I think my heart lies in larger scale work with a fine art outcome. However it has been useful to develop an awareness of this art form and to see how Hanny is adapting this skill to new artistic applications.

[julieleach-blog]

Charleston Reflections

 "Mental fight means thinking against the current, not with it. It is our business to ........... discover the seeds of truth." Virginia Woolf

I didn't need to be told, I just knew, I could feel it, something very special had happened here.

And if there hadn't been such a sense of warmth and love it would have sent shivers down my spine but instead it brought me close to tears. 

I battled the A27 through torrential rain and navigated the muddy potholes of the long farm track to a house in the middle of nowhere, or so it felt, in the dank, autumnal afternoon gloom. No hoards of noisy tourists, no bright directions to facilities but a pervading greyness, a cocooned silence, the real world disconnected.  

I wasn't alone but such was the atmosphere I felt as if I was, as if I had stumbled over Charleston on a country walk and Vanessa Bell or Duncan Grant might appear through the garden gate and suggest a cup of tea in the garden room. Dimmed lights shadowed the interior, protecting the ageing murals and exacerbating my mood. An invitation on the mantle piece, a child's drawing pinned at an angle, an open paint tube, had they just popped out and may be back in a moment or two?

Here was a unique world, created from scratch by the non-conformists who lived here, nothing imitated or 'off the shelf' but a brave new world of personally crafted objects, life style and philosophies. Here a bed painted for Vanessa by Duncan, a ceramic lampshade fashioned by the hands of her son, Quentin, the curtains at her window 'White' from her own designs for the Omega workshops in 1913. Barely a crevice undecorated, barely a canvas not from their own brush.

This was a hub of intellectual debate and creative endeavour, where work was the purpose of the day and friendship of paramount importance.

"In this extraordinary little house, there gathered some of the greatest talents, in some cases geniuses, of the century." Lord Hattersley

Here was the room where Vanessa's husband and art theorist Clive Bell slept, and here her lover's, here the room where Maynard Keynes wrote The Economic Consequences of the Peace in 1919 and here the table where Diaghilev, T. S. Eliot, E. M. Forster, Jean Renoir and so many more dined and laughed and talked, talked, talked.

Portrait of John Maynard Keynes by Duncan Grant, 1917. © The Charleston Trust

“The house seems full of young people in very high spirits, laughing a great deal at their own jokes… lying about in the garden which is simply a dithering blaze of flowers and butterflies and apples.” Vanessa Bell 1936

They lived the lives they wanted to live, unshaken by opinion or convention.

"I think it was a wonderful existence for everybody, everybody was entirely happy and doing exactly what they wanted to do all the time" Angelica Garnet nee Bell

Homosexuality was embraced, sex was discussed and practised with openness, honesty was sought in life and love. Affairs started and ended without acrimony or stultifying sense of duty and the bond of friendship survived all.

"The atmosphere was full of catastrophies that upset no-one." Virginia Woolf

They achieved a way of life out of 'sinc' with their contemporaries but which, a hundred years later, is an inspiration and aspiration of a later generation.

Was it intruding to look at the bed where she died, to see her son's portrait on the wall and hear how his death and that of her sister, Virginia Woolf, shook her to the core, changing her indomitable character for ever? Have I been so affected by the mood of the day and the place that I have romanticised what happened here and changed their quest for a truthful life into a tale of fiction?

"Whenever one really knows the facts, one finds that what is accepted by contemporaries or posterity as the truth about them is so distorted or out of focus that it is not worth worrying about.” Leonard Woolf

Vanessa Bell Painting by Duncan Grant 1915