more natural characters

 

 

It is now a full month since my time at Fiskars Village Artist Residency in Finland.  It’s been a busy month of travel and seeing new things, but now I’m back in Australia (and back to winter), and busy with installing Fog and Faultines at Megalo Print Studio here in Canberra.  With all of that, four feet, the tumblr site for our residency project has been a little quite, but not any more.  The major outcome from the residency was a set of drypoint prints made collaboratively between myself and fellow resident David Wills, titled Natural Characters.  We are planning to upload all of these images to four feet, one per day over the next month or so.

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natural characters

‘Natural Characters’, Drypoint and Collograph in 32 parts, Davis Wills and Peter McLean, 2012.

It was a big push to get all our printing done on time, but we made it, and here is the final install of ‘Natural Characters’, our collaborative project of drypoint and collograph prints.  32 panels in all with each one 20×20 cm.

Sadly, today is the last day in the Artist in Residence house in Fiskars.  We had a lovely open studio/exhibition Friday night, and quite a few of the locals came along to see what we had been doing.  It turned into quite a late night with the grilling of moose sausages over a fire sometime around midnight.  Saturday was spent doing the things we’d been meaning to do for the month but had somehow missed, like the museum, the Desico candle shop, the Fiskars Company shop, and one last cinnamon bun with some of our new friends from Fiskars.

 

more prints

 

 

The end of our residency here at Fiskars is looming rapidly, and so we have been working pretty solidly to try and get things done before our open studio show on Friday evening.  We have both been working on our various individual projects, like my little set of wood engravings, and Dave has been uploading new photo’s to Turnstile’s Shootin’ Gallery.  As well as all that, the main piece we are aiming to show we be a grid of 32 drypoint prints (with the odd relief printed collograph in there too), with each of us having contributed half the prints.  This is Dave’s first foray into printmaking since undergrad, so I’ve been helping him with all the inking and wiping a project like this entails.

Being on a short term residency in an unfamiliar place can call for some new approaches to things.  The ink I ended up with, was a Graphic Chemicals ‘Stiff Black’ etching ink.  It’s ok for wood engraving, but not nearly as foolproof as litho ink.  On the other hand it is way too sticky for wiping an intaglio plate – especially when you have been using the one piece of tarletan for way too long!  Lacking any plate oil, or ‘easy wipe’ compound, I’ve been adding a bit of the cheep oil paint that I picked up in the discount variety store in Karjaa one day.  I bought a little tube, not knowing what for, since there was a colour that matched the Falu Red colour of the houses.  Makes my black nice and warm.

Lots more prints to pull tomorrow, so I’d better get to bed.

If you happen to be in Fiskars this Friday (29th June) in the evening, 18-20, then do drop by at the Artist in Residence house to see the whole set!

 

 

studio

I thought it was time I shared a few photo’s of the Artist in Residence studio here at Fiskars – in the basement of the apartment.  It is sparsely appointed, but I’ve got it looking productively messy, and the school’s etching press that happens to be being stored in the back room at the moment is getting a workout.  Finally a look back out the door and down the hill, past the SIWA (small grocery store) and to the new carpark.  From my desk I can watch the constant too-ing and fro-ing of locals going to SIWA, and the tourists and visitors crossing the market from their cars to the craft shops and galleries.  For a town with 600 residents it manages to feel quite busy.

 

 

spruce

I collected this new cone from a Norway Spruce tree (Picea abies) on the walk to Pohja, the next town.  I knew it was Spruce, because Fiskars has a tree species trail with examples of all the common species of the area signed with numbers which correspond to a companion brochure, (in English, Finnish, and Swedish) so I’ve been trying to learn to recognise them all.

 

Sometimes the ex-botanist in me comes to the fore again, and I like to make drawings in a sciency mode – not that I have really followed the rules of proper scientific drawing, but the labels made with my new rubber stamp kit lend an air of formality.  Interesting how closely the colour of the spruce cone matches the deep red of most of the timber buildings here in Fiskars, including all the houses.

four feet

My first morning in Fiskars Village, Finland.  It is cool and raining, so I don’t mind too much being inside with a head cold instead of out walking.  This month-long residency will be a collaborative effort with David Wills, and we have started a new blog for the residency called Four Feet (fourfeet.tumblr.com/).  In the last days before leaving Australia I bought a little rubber stamp set with movable type and the above was just my first play with it.  I’m hoping it will be useful for book projects and the likes.

I’m sure I will have plenty of images and artwork to share over the next month, and I’ll post some here at Art Out and About as well as over at Four Feet, so stay tuned.

hello Fiskars

This is my new home for the next month, the artist in residence house in the artist’s village of Fiskars in Finland.  Yes Finland!  I’ve just arrived and still feeling a little unsteady on my feet after the long flights etc, but keen to get out and explore what promises to be beautiful surroundings.  In the meantime, have a look at www.onoma.org, our hosts the Artisans, Designers and Artists Cooperative of Fiskars.