Author: Seb Palmer

This is the best of my first baby steps in printmaking. Two card plates. They’re supposed to align, roughly. I got the alignment all wrong!

Getting the amount of ink on the plates right is key. Soaking the paper onto which you’re printing is also important. Although how you do that – a misting spray, perhaps? – on multiple layer prints? I’m not sure.

It’s early days for us, of course… Day one, to be exact. But what fun! And we’ve got a lot to learn (and re-learn).

I scribed more linear ‘detail’ on the main plate. But forgot to re-shellac it… doh! And getting the inking right!? Nowhere near getting that right, yet.

The above is the nearest I got to getting the plates aligned as intended. Sadly the inking and printing are altogether more sketchy and random.

So… not one of these has come out as intended. Bug it’s all good. All learning and experience. We were both quite slapdash in our printing today. But enthusiastic.

A fascinating strand of cultural history… and you can view/read a whole book on this topic, Children of The Sun, online.

I do love zooming in on and cropping my art works. I feel the process yields new and unexpected but usable imagery.

I’d like to experiment with printing processes – perhaps collagraph and monoprints? – and see if I can achieve something in that line with this imagery.

There’s something a little bit Blakean going on here, I think. That’s definitely something to explore further.

Wow! Finally finished this epic whopper of a tome. 929 pages (not inc indices, bibliog, etc.); feels like I’ve been reading it for years!

It’s a very good read. Broken into 94 easily digested bite-sized chapters. And written in a very balanced readable style.

The garden is looking fabulous.

We’ll have been here nine years, this summer. And the magnolia has been growing over the Green Room for about five years. Will this year be the first to see it in proper full bloom? We do hope so.

It’s nice to be out in the morning. With the Sun casting her shadows westwards, over the pond.

Coffee and pastries. Very nice.

And here’s a gallery of lovely garden pics.

There are still several large areas that are a hopeless mess. Such as this, by the house and blue shed:

There’s a helluva lorra work remaining to be done. But, nevertheless, the garden is looking and feeling very lovely.

I also declutterred the lawn. As it was a right ‘orrible mess.

The area that’s shaded by the fence, on the left, always struggle. And tends to remain a weedy grass-less zone. What to do? Yet more rolls of turf? Only to see the same thing happen!? Hmmm…

The old shed needs tearing down. To allow the ‘art studio’ to finally be built. A d that whole end/area needs a serious declutterring and tidying up.

A bit King Canute-ish, perhaps? no sooner than they’re cleared, more blossoms fall. Hey ho!

Got two shifts today: a shorty at two pm, and a long’un, in the evening. I’m going to allow myself a treat, again, if I exceed my minimum earning threshold.

Or, put another way, I have to exceed my minimum earning threshold by £35 this week, to cover this indulgence.

Just came back from brunch at ‘Spoons. Weather is gorgeous. So we’re out in the garden.

It’s sooo nice. Thought I’d try and do a bit of arty business outdoors.

The neighbours kids – Ellie and Maya – have a friend over. It’s Easter break. Kids are on their holidays. Screaming girlies! It’s also Teresa’s first day of holiday, today. Conundrum…

INTERLUDE – WORK

I’m rather enjoying the Picassian and/or Priapic naughtiness of the phallic thumb and, er… the whatchu-McCallum? The fleshy pads that form the lower ‘heel’ of the hand?

Well… a quick look online tells me they’re called the thenar and hypothenar eminences! The thenar being below the thumb, and the hypothenar being the other side/half.

I’m finding this one intriguing. And if I zoom in, there are promising areas.

As ever, these pass through several stages. And I’m often left worrying that they’re utterly shite. But I’m managing, just about, these days… to push through that brown wall.

And I actually wi d up liking quite a bit of what I’m doing. At least I feel there’s both so e continuity, with past efforts, and potential, for future developments.

The above has the potential phallic readings in there, a bit. And it also has, for my (total lack of) money, something a bit late Phillip Guston about it. Which I love, of course.

This one, directly above, I really dig. Esp’ in this cropped form. It’s almost statuesque. And, for me at least, it has a Picassian grandeur that combines both weight and ugliness with passion and splendour!

FOOTNOTE:

And this little cropping, of one of the above, gives – I think – a really cool composition.

Does this also have potential?

And finally, working up one of these pieces…

Day’s end. Back in the house…