Wrexham Project Sorry I missed the meeting with you all, this is my response to Almas work and how I got there: My commissioned doorstops arrive, perfect. I print my images onto lazertran, now comes the tricky bit, you have to soak the backing off, let them dry again, apply pure turps to the wood, lay on the lazertran (which by now is very brittle and fragile – don’t try and move it because it disintegrates causing much swearing and starting again) leave to dry. Not wanting to touch the surface again I buy some spray polyurethane varnish to coat and protect the images, this also allows eliminates the opacity of the transfer and allows the grain of the wood to show through and become part of the image. I was hoping to try some Gum Arabic transfer printing at Badger Press having been invited to share the studio and the cost! Frustratingly this got cancelled at the last minute so I had to try it at home. It took me a while to get the hang of it as I hadn’t tried it before, basically I wasn’t using enough water to take the ink of the white areas. Once I got the hang of it I did get some good prints. I think they might have been better with a press instead of rubbing by hand, I had to improvise by laying an acetate over the gummed copy as it was too fragile to rub directly. I will certainly experiment with this technique further, I particularly liked a very watery effect and this went well with my beach subject matter. The colour is an ultramarine/burnt umber mix – grey blue sepia! The colour of memory. I used some of the prints to cut up and apply to a small box. This is the escape box. Alma’s interior shots spoke to me of not wanting to be trapped in domestic drudgery anymore, so when things get bad I hope she could look at this box. The title of the work is Sanctuary Hut Box, the images on the outside are of beach huts and pebbles. Inside is lined with found oilskin, pebbles, shells, and seaweed. There is a postcard, written on it is the experience of escaping for a day and walking on the beach. Then there is the doorstop, again with images of pebbles and huts. This is either to stop the door open, to allow escape, or to stop the door closed and stop anyone disturbing a private daydream. So this is my constructed place for Alma, a small safe place that can also be used to store her own mementos and memory triggers; and remind her of a much bigger place outside the confines of her daily life. Louise Tett
