Edition #13, colour proof finalised...
As we head into the summer proper, I thought you'd like to see a photo of my recently completed initial colour proof of edition #13, which should be in the post to you shortly. It's a 90cm square textile version of my interStella drawing, printed by Citrus Rain in Manchester. I have to say I think they've done a pretty good job, although it does perhaps need an iron! It makes for a very different thing from my more usual works on paper. I hope you like it when you receive it…
Print Club Ed #13, an interStella headscarf, progress report...
I thought I'd send over a progress report! Ed #13, which will be a 90cm SQ headscarf, digitally printed by Citrus Rain in Manchester, is my first foray into the world of short run digital textile printing. I'm quite excited by the prospect. Back in my Soho studio days, I worked for Prada, Yohji Yamamoto and Nike, to name just 3 of the fashion and textile brands I made images for, but these were promo images, not the raw fabric designs.
interStella / QUAD
intersStella is a new series of sixteen drawings, arranged into four quads, with four works in each quad. These new works on paper comprise Venn like geometries based on circadian rhythms, bought to life with a series of sixteen colour variants, which I hope speak to the idea of the four seasons, plant life, and perhaps tulips in particular. They clearly also riff on the work of Frank Stella, a true hero of colour abstraction
Experimental Print Club #11
I’ve just dispatched edition #11 for the print club. It’s titled interStella / EPC / home. The piece combines a variant from my new interStella series with photography from the garden, specifically the soil under my sweet peas. I like the idea of experimenting with ideas around combining drawing and photography, and of course the subject matter alludes to ideas including the sense of place, the idea of growth, and the earth, or soil, as root, and begins to unpack some new ideas about permaculture, and how that may sit with my practice in the future.
interStella 2019
I’ve been working on a new series of 16 drawings, entitled interStella. It’s kind of a mash up of a number of geometries I’ve been studying, but most obviously an exploration, and complication, of the maths underlying the early works of American legend Frank Stella. I first saw his beautiful, epic, artworks at MOCA in LA in 1991, and was completely blown away. So it’s been on my mind for a long time to try and unpack some of his thinking, and riff on that beautiful style that came out of NYC in the late sixties. I hope I’ve bought a little fresh thinking and technique to bear too.
Summer 2019, interStella WIP
The inclusion of garden photography is coming in from that idea of combining the maths with and from nature, a kind of hybrid organic / digital fusion that hopefully speaks to the idea of the digital overlaying the natural world in ways that are both positive and beneficial. I’ve been out on some demos with Extinction Rebellion recently, enjoying the positivity of the movement, and am keen to try and think about how a contemporary art studio can sit lightly with the issues surrounding climate change.