Year of Printmaking: February Chinese Lanterns

   

This weeks print is my monthly calendar print for February; I decided to focus on the upcoming Chinese New Year and depict some red Chinese lanterns. It's my first two colour linocut and was more detailed than I intended (hello difficult Chinese characters that try to say Happy Chinese New Year!) but I learned a lot to take into my next print and am pleased with how it turned out.

Here's a version to work as a free wallpaper for your phone (while I work on making these available as prints in my etsy shop):

新年快樂 

{See January's Meteor Shower Print}

Happy Burns Night!

Happy Burns Night! Time to indulge in haggis, neeps & tatties while listening to some Burns poetry. Here's a little portrait I created of Burns himself with some of his famous works and a few of my favourite lines of his. Also to get you in the Burns spirit you must see this beautiful performance of 'I'll meet you on the Lea-rig' by Roddy Woomble from a BBC Burns Night programme a few years ago.

{I made it into a t-shirt & some other goodies over on redbubble}

Don't want Burns Night to end? see my Burns Night posts from 2015 & 2014

Year of Printmaking: Walden Monoprint

 

Experimenting with simple print techniques this week in a minimalist monoprint inspired by Henry David Thoreau's cabin in the woods by Walden pond. Monoprint's are exciting in how quick they can be produced, just place paper over your inked up surface and draw onto the paper and then reveal something spectacularly unexpected!

Mountain brooches

 

Mt Fuji | K2

I love mountains, walking up them can sometimes be quite a challenge and then you're suddenly on the top of the world, feeling so inspired at nature and your small part in it. Here's a few mountains I love & now you can wear them whenever you feel the wanderlust of the mountains calling your name!

Mt Fuji is on the top of my list to go to along with Japan! & here's a very blue & bold K2, have you read No Way Down, all about the climbing incident on K2 in where lost their lives? it's a brilliant account of how the mountain is always in control. 

 

Matterhorn

The Matterhorn is such an iconic shape & it's so beautiful with the hamlet of Zermatt nestled just below it in the amazingly crisp Swiss Alps air. You can get a cable car up to the lake below the peak, but we walked up to it to get this great view!

   

 I also did a special commission of the 'Dents du Midi' Mountains in Switzerland where we go skiing for a friend's 30th Birthday! What mountain would you choose, if you want to commission a mountain of your own choosing, just get in touch!

What's your favourite mountain?

Year of Printmaking: Bike Block Printing

 

I made this print as a birthday card for a friend who loves cycling. Block printing using shapes and objects you have to hand (I used a foam circle & a rubber) is really quick and effective. I'm really pleased with how this turned out it made such a quick cute card.

Studio Pouches on Redbubble

Redbubble has released some really great products recently including these studio pouches. Here are a few of my designs that work really well on them:

  Oyster Catchers | Octopus

 

 Snowboarder | Mount Everest

Pink & Black Box Pattern | Skier

Walk Man | Sakura Blossoms

Heart Pretzel | Chrysler Building

Think I might have to get the 'Walden', 'Chrysler' or perhaps the 'Walk Man' design which is based on a photo of a walkway or sidewalk I took in New York, love it!

Year of Printmaking: Self Portrait Linocut

   

As I'm trying to make this my year of printmaking I'll try to post a new print here every Friday, as life can sometimes get in the way of plans it won't always happen but I'll try to do better than last year when moving house really threw off my rhythm for the second half of the year.

I don't think I've done a self portrait since school, so I thought it was a good time to try a linocut version. As I always have my hair tied back and the UK winter entombs you in a big coat, it's only right that my self portrait be that way too.

 

Art to See London 2016

Science Museum: Cosmonauts Natural History Museum: Otherworlds: Visions of our Solar System Tate Modern: Robert Rauschenburg

Barbican: The World of Charles & Ray Eames | Imran Qureshi Leighton House Museum: Pre-Raphaelites on Paper 

Dulwich Picture Gallery: Painting Norway | Winifred Knights ICA: Betty Woodman

I'm a big art fan; I love going to exhibitions, seeing works on the street, travelling to see special exhibitions and walking to local exhibitions; it gives me great joy, feeds my soul and I get inspired by seeing beautiful, challenging, often strange and contradictory works, whether I think it's good or bad, it always makes me feel alive.

Over the last few years I've done quite a few blogposts of art to see around the world {here's a few of the most popular ones- Europe Part 1, Europe Part 2 and Asia ) & this year I'm going to do a monthly series of them throughout the year, this time focusing on cities. As I'm planning a London trip in February it's the perfect place to start.

Tate Modern: Calder |  Mona Hatoum |  Georgia O'Keefe

Whitechapel Gallery: Mary Heilman | Guerilla Girls Hauser & Wirth: Tetsumi Kudo

Royal Academy: Ann Christopher |  Painting the Modern Garden Alan Cirstea: Gabo's Monoprints

Where to next?

Year of Printmaking: New Year, New Project

 

   

This year I'm going to make it my 'Year of Printmaking' so to start I'm doing a monthly calendar project where each print represent that month; it may be a specific event I'm looking forward to, like this month or who knows what as the project develops. To kick off January I've looked to the Quadrantids Meteor Shower which can be seen on 3-4th January (weather depending, no more rain please!) 

 

I also did a colour version to work as a free phone wallpaper (just right click & save this version) These prints are now available for sale in my etsy shop & I will collect them all into a calendar for next year!

Happy New Year 2016!