RWA 161st Open Exhibition

Yesterday I was thrilled to be able to go down to the RWA to see one of my prints, 'Weather beaten track' included in this year's annual open exhibition.

Its fascinating to see which images are selected for shows like this. For some people this was the less obvious choice of the images I submitted, but it is the one that is looser in the drawing and handling of resists - therefore more adventurous for an etching? Perhaps this is what the selectors saw in it.

The print/drawing room had a lot of good quality work by some of my favourites of this show, including Fiona Robinson, Ros Ford and Laurie Steen and I felt honoured to be hanging right next to David Carpanini's atmospheric etchings inspired by Welsh villages.

Etchings by David Carpanini - beautiful sooty blacks

It was also good to see lots of representatives of UWE's MA Print course, and of the Gloucestershire Printmaking Co-op.

Its a good show, worth a visit if you're in the Bristol area.

Charcoal drawing - May Path

I've been making a few large scale sketches to work out images that have possibilities for etching.

This is the most recent image to be transferred into etching, drawn from sketchbook studies and photos taken back in May when the new growth was starting to fill out and when the sun was quite high.

By late summer it became almost impossible to make out the floor of this path, so I had to revert to photos to finish the drawing.


adaptions to the foreground and shadows 

There's a lot of new work underway at the moment for the exhibition at New Brewery Arts in January, but not a lot finished... back to the drawing board for me then.

Charcoal drawing - viewpoint

I wondered if a different viewpoint would produce an interesting piece.

 



I noticed this minor path made by animals when I was doing a photographic recce at the end of the summer. The scale of the leaves and the dark leading to the light intrigued me.
The drawing challenged me, and there was more interpretation on the drawing board than I expected.

This earlier stage shows how the tonal balance and shaping changed as the drawing progressed. The process of bringing a drawing from the paper continues to be both challenging and endlessly fascinating.