A year in prints
Don’t worry, there’s only 8 that got finished
My son was much amused by the toe of his stocking becoming a sort of Russian roulette of muddy golf balls and Cadbury’s Christmas puddings, which were the most golf ball sized chocolate I could find. He wasn’t expecting a stocking because he wanted a bike, which he rode around for some hours, almost certainly to places where he wasn’t mean to be riding bikes. I wander towards college to see where he’s got to, and he peddles furiously past me, his face flushed with the cold, and the excitement of a new found freedom.
On of the advantages of Christmas Day is I am free to wander about the golf course without worry; the cormorants were there, sitting on their dead tree, and as I approached, one launched into the air, did a seemingly unnecessary lap of the lake, and flew off in the direction of the big lakes. I took this to be a Christmas gift, an answer to the riddle; they do come over for a quiet time fishing when the Christmas party at the popular lakes gets too much. I knew it. The kestrel was nearby too, and the crow-flock has amassed, much larger than previous years even, a splendid sight when they fly over, a sky full of birds. All is well in my small world.
The world pauses, probably in confusion (what day is it, even) as we wait for the year to turn. Here’s a review of my year; it’s not very exciting. I didn’t achieve much, but I’m alive, and I’m very happy, and that enough for me. This years prints:
One: The apple tree. A straight two block linocut, it’s probably my favourite of year. I’ll be printing up a nocturnal version of this as soon as I can get some more white ink.
Two: pebbles. A simple collograph I found quite pleasing. It was a small print, and I intended to incorporate into a more elaborate print but I haven’t got round to that yet.
Three: the seaserpent. I made this for the handprinted challenge ‘entangled’ prompt and won some adigraph inks, which was exciting. It’s also been a fairly popular print, along with the other dragon, which leads me to believe I should stop drawing wildlife and start drawing imaginary things so people can’t tell me I’m doing it wrong
Four: swallows. A follow up to last years swifts, and similarly popular, which is keeping me in ink and paper.
Five: More dragons. A fairly simple reduction print as I got to grips with the technique, surprisingly popular with Americans for a print largely celebrating Oxford (and its subterranean dragon population)
Six: Poppies. A small linocut exploring texture and shadow, in case I wanted to do a larger linocut of poppies. Which I didn’t, but might in the future, because it looks quite nice.
Seven: winter skies reduction print. I think probably large scale reduction prints are not for me, but I still like this. It’s more to do with the process of carving, printing a layer, and then carving again when I prefer to be left alone to carve for three weeks. Still, that’s good information to know.
Eight: my first lithograph. I find the concept of lithography quite exciting, and will definitely be exploring the process more in the future.
In some ways, not the most productive year, with only 8 prints finished which, frustratingly for me, don’t feel very cohesive stylistically. On the whole, though, they were larger prints, and more challenging in terms of learning new techniques which I’m looking forward to using those in the printstravaganza I’m sure 2024 will become. On wards and upwards, friends x