The tree theme for my prints began with a walk in Wentworth Castle Gardens in May 2011. At the time I’d been reading about creating movement in photographic images where you set a slow shutter speed and then move the camera as the shutter closes. The images that you see here were all taken on that walk although I’ve subsequently re-edited some of them in Picasa to add different colour effects.
After the photograph stage came thinking about how to use the images to create a print. I decided to construct a collograph plate using torn edged paper derived from a number of different sources, i.e. thin corrugated paper, hand-made oriental paper as well as standard cartridge.
Tip: It’s easier to tear the paper if you paint an outline shape with plain water and leave it to soak for a few minutes before attempting the tear.
Unusually for me I didn’t start with a very defined idea or set of drawings before I created the first collograph plate. Though I did make some charcoal sketches it was a ll rather experimental, which in a way led to some insecurity later on as I tried to evaluate whether the print was successful or not.
Having made the top tree layer I’d decided that I needed a background layer which I created with a mix of torn paper and gesso. (The gesso was marked and textured as it was drying.)
With the two collograph plates created I was ready to print. Initially I thought I’d add the cut-out figure of a young girl walking through the trees as a chine colle but in the end I abandoned that version as too twee. (Looking back through my photographs, on what was such a mixed year for various reasons, I realise that I’d achieved my most successful print in the series by October 2011, though I subsequently carried on printing the plate trying to print others in the series.)
Printing the plates
I decided to move away from keeping the colours totally naturalistic and to use red on some of the tree trunks to give some spark to the scene, red being the complementary opposite of green on the colour circle. I also wanted to keep the background plate very recessive to provide depth so I used my print colour heavily diluted with extender.
Initially I had several prints where I was pleased with the colour but unsure whether they lacked focus in the composition. So I tried adding paint and other elements to the one on the left by way of experiment. Though I learnt from the experiment I’m not sure that it worked for me at the time. From this first print run I felt I had two prints that were reasonably successful. I prefer the top image, not only colour wise but also because of the gap through the trees that provides depth.
One of the main difficulties I need to overcome when printing is the weekly gap between days when I can use the press (we rent studio space on one day a week). It’s so easy to lose track and the flow of working, especially as this was further compounded by a busy period when I had other things happening in my life.
Wendy North 