A Path between Rock, 2017, intaglio, rice paper and handmade paper, over a digital print, 75×25 cm
Pink Lakes, Victoria, 2001, 4, 2017, digital print, handmade paper and rice paper and indian ink wash, 75 x 25 cm.
When I compare collage and mixed media compositions with oil painted compositions sharing the same topic, I become aware of how different media often suit particular topics.
In this case contemporary art about the environment and the forces of nature somehow is suited to the dryness of rice paper as well as handmade paper as they become simulations of the earth’s surface and landforms. The dusty terrain, desiccated rock surfaces, cracked salt-laden and powdery surfaces and dry sand depictions, although semi abstracted, seem so much easier to portray with various collages than with the lush textures and viscosity of oil paint. Impasto especially can look too lush when alluding to Australia’s ancient land.
One solution to attain the powdery delicate but ancient bleached look was when I mixed grated pastel into gesso and then applied liberally on top of gesso ground whether on canvas, paper or wood surface. I usually begin with this technique but am often not quite satisfied with the end result so I will keep on experimenting.
I feel as though this small series has ended for now and oil painting is calling once again back to psychological portraits where oil paint is a sympathetic medium in which to portray subtleties and nuanced tonal values.
Journey, 2017, digital image, handmade paper, rice paper and gold leaf, 75×30 cm
From Rock to Palette, 2017, digital image, handmade paper, rice paper and gold leaf, 75 x 30 cm
The final rendition of Anbangbang Billabong with two more collaged digital images. In Journey, 2017, I returned to figuration referencing characteristics of Neolithic Goddess figurines where the creators combined abstracted anatomical elements with naturalism. I let random shapes suggest the presence of anatomical structure onto which I placed abstracted shapes to suggest particular anatomical features.
In Rock to Palette, 2017, I connected a palette image in the lower section of the composition with rock strata simulated and formed from different overlapped paper textures. Over time the formation of oxides complete a journey ending as pigment on a palette.
Journey to the Underworld, 2016, digital, ricepaper and handmade paper, 75×30 cm
Arrival of the Dry Season, 2016, digital print, rice paper and pastel paper, 75×30 cm
Once again I overlaid two digital images with various types of paper where my aim was to play with transparencies.
Ubirr Rock, 2003, pastel and ink , 102×30 cm
Journey to the Underworld, 2016, digital, ricepaper and handmade paper, 75×30 cm
In the first panel the image beneath was reversed with the pen – line outlined image of a palette becoming the site of departure for a metaphorical journey to the artists’ mental underworld of creative inspiration.
The first digital layer looked very different when a sheet of black pastel paper covered figurative elements of the composition beneath. A sheet of rice paper over black made a mottled grey texture of varying thickness within the paper’s texture. I left the bottom half remained much the same except for a piece of rust stained paper harmonious with orange sections of the composition.
Anbangbang Billabong, pastel and ink, 102×30 cm.
Arrival of the Dry Season, 2016, digital print, rice paper and pastel paper, 75×30 cm
An organic appearance of the first image transformed into a combination of abstraction plus elements of the organic.
The collage treatment of my original artwork digitalised into an edition onto printmaking paper continues, allowing strong colour beneath to show through the finely textured rice paper. This effect is similar to an oil painting technique where a thin semi transparent veil of paint can be painted over often flat strong colour as a way to give atmospheric depth to a composition. I love the play of opaque surfaces with tonal atmospheric and nuanced texture and much overlapping adding to the sense of ‘painting with paper’.
Nuanced texture and atmospheric tonal values made from overlapping transparent, semi transparent and semi opaque layers of either paper or paint produce and effect that seem so characteristic of outback Australian landscapes – no glaringly obvious focal points, in-defined shapes, blinding sunlight and obscuring dust haze and quivering mirage obscuring clear any horizon line.
We arrived at this location in the dry season when burning off was in progress making the haze, glare, heat contribute to how I imagined these images as I sat next to the dried billabong with its remnant and dried vegetation transported by wet season floods left caught on sticks and branches scattered across the dusty surface that resembled triangular stooks of hay.
Anbangbang Billabong Flood Plain, 2017, rice paper collage and pen and ink, 75×30 cm
Flood Plain Across Anbangbang Billabong, 2017, rice paper collage on original digital image plus ink wash and pen, 75×30 cm
Early this century I joined an art tour to the Northern Territory where we spent time sketching and painting in Kakadu and Nitmiluk National Parks at sites like Ubirr Rock, Katherine Gorge and at Anbangbang Billabong near Nourlangi Rock.
I produced, among others, two images one about Anbangbang Billabong and the other about Ubirr Rock on Fabriano print paper as it readily absorbed diluted indian ink and damp grated pastel and water plus a little gesso as I depicted part of the dried billabong quickly before the moist surface dried in the heat.
A collector bought the two originals. With permission I put their files into ‘Sketchbook’ and made a few alterations digitally from which several smaller prints of the digital images were made and printed onto Hanhlemehule printmaking paper in keeping with the originals. A small problem was that although I liked the colour before printing, later I wasn’t as happy as the colour seemed too bright. So I left them for a while and returned to oil painting.
Ubirr Rock, 2003, pastel and ink , 102×30 cm
Ubirr Rock, digital reproduction
Anbangbang Billabong, pastel and ink, 102×30 cm.
Anbangbang Billabong, digital reproduction
But the November sales of printmaking, handmade and rice papers in Fitzroy turned out to be a paper fest. – so hard to go past so many wonderful surfaces, textures, semi-transparencies and muted colours all completely filling my plan drawers. An affinity between the drawer in which these gorgeous papers lay and the drawer below in which the reproduced prints lay sparked in my mind. I imagined the strongly coloured prints placed behind the recently purchased semi-transparent papers and thought that there could be an interesting juxtaposition between not quite literal format of the printed images and the wabi sabi effect of rice paper etc. So I got to it – the evolution of an image.
Anbangbang Billabong, pastel and ink, 102×30 cm.
Anbangbang Billabong, digital reproduction
Memory of Anbangbang Billabong, 2016, collage, 75×25 cm
Ubirr Rock, 2003, pastel and ink , 102×30 cm
Ubirr Rock, digital reproduction
Preliminary Sketch at Ubirr Rock, 2016, collage, 75×25 cm
In the last image of the first composition titled Memory at Anbangbang Billabong, 2016 little remains visible of imagery beneath, having completely covered any reference to the landform in the background top section of the composition. The black and mauve shape echoes the original but is back to front. Beneath the semi trans-parent sheet of paper with an ink stain provided a surface into which I carved out short lines with a scalpel alluding to the lines in the original that indicated the presence of a dried flood plain minus its billabong having evaporated by scorching sun in a cloudless sky so characteristic of the dry season in northern Australia.
In Preliminary Sketch at Ubirr Rock, 2016 an ink washed piece of rice paper became the first layer into which I carved different shapes again revealing glimpses of the print beneath. The simplicity provided by the textured and slightly tonally graded rice paper alluded to rocky texture with out being too literal. Once again less was more.
Just returned from Kardinia Framers where the buyer made a good choice with a plain wooden frame.
The latest David Hockney exhibition at the NGV has some artists and many art appreciative friends inquiring into these types of technique. A few years ago I explored different ways digital images could emerge with photographs wether drawn directly onto my iPad or iPhone or incorporating photographs of oil paintings with digital apps. as a way to completely change the image surface but retain the structure and composition.
Weathered Columns 2, 2008-09, oil on canvas, 214×108 cm.
Weathered Columns 2, 2008-09, oil on canvas, 214×108 cm.
Weathered Columns 3, 2011, digital
Weathered Columns 4, 2011, digital
I could print out the digital images onto small dimension printmaking paper and then rework the surface with traditional materials like pen and ink.
I still need to learn how to manage layers when constructing the digital layers but I imaging it may resemble layering oil painting techniques going from thin lean underpainting up through the layers to the thicker oilier opaque final layer depending on the painting style. Transparencies and semi opaque or semi transparent layers would make interesting texture as an element of the image. It’s also another way to try preliminary versions before launching into a large painting. The digital images could also be expanded into large images and placed photographically onto canvas. Just by using one image as a template it could be manipulated into countless versions transforming from a landscape into something else. Friends have pointed out that within the first digital rendition a head is emerging in portrait form. Turning the composition sideways into landscape horizontal form, a head appears to look out into a strange landscape too. I enjoy this type of response and interaction where different people see different things and reveal aspects of themselves in the process.
At Muddy’s She Shed during the weekend Surf Coast Arts Trail event, the studio, temporarily transformed into a gallery, had a steady stream of viewers on both days. Interested participants created gelatine prints using Anglesea flora. Several items that included Maggi Jean’s ceramics, small sculptures – (a small elephant herd) and artists’ books – ( Anglesea flora and seaweeds) found good homes as well as Evie Wood’s poetry books, cards, watercolours and an acrylic still life titled Pink Lady Interior, 2016.
Point Addis Daisy, 2016 by Margaret Jean.
Pink Lady Interior, 2016, acrylic, 40×40 cm by Evie Wood.
Several of my digital prints were also purchased. The oldest had been part of my PhD exegesis, titled Natalie (Demeter/Persephone) and the most recent was a reproduction of a viscosity printed collagraph that started as an experiment with the viscosity printing technique but also required additional chine-colle as a way to give the composition some space and atmosphere.
Natalie ( Demeter / Peresophone), 2016, ( original 1995, intaglio, ink and wash, 98 X 66 cm.)
Snowfields 2, 2016, viscosity print and hand made paper, 50x35cm
My sketchbook images were reference for larger images mainly because I usually capture energy and movement in the initial mark making. Several images done on folded Fabriano print making paper meant that being absorbent the fibers would retain my application of pastel staining. Large pastel stick grated with my Stanley box cutter knife stained and bled into damp paper but also mixed in water like a slurry. Because the paper was tough and absorbent I made lines into which colour accumulated by gouging into the paper with the blunt side of my knife. For example:
Flood plain at Anbangbang Billabong
Sketch in ink pen from Anbangbang Billabong
Kakadu landscape titled Anbangbang Billabong 5, 2003, 30×102 cm, pastel stain on Fabriano
Kakadu landscape titled Anbangbang Billabong 4, 2003, 30×100 cm, pastel stain on Fabriano
Return, 2/10, 2013, digital print 50×42 cm print, 58×47 cm paper
Kakadu landscape titled Anbangbang Billabong Revisited, 1/10, 2013, 75×25 cm print, 82×31 cm paper, on Hahnemuhle
Digital image titled Billabong Revision 1, 2013
Two parts of this landscape captured my attention. Firstly the hole in one end of the background rock formation that reminded me of an eye. It felt as though we were being watched from afar. The other part was the dry billabong where triangle-shaped debris made of dry vegetation caught on sticks and branches. Swept into these shapes by a raging torrent in the previous wet season, they scattered across the flood plain . The other element captured was heat haze on the plain with blue sky. The pastel image with jagged lines resembling teeth may have been influenced sub-consciously by warnings to watch out for crocodiles.
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