an Professional Development Bursary 2017 (1)

This grant has enabled me to achieve more than initially anticipated in a different way than planned but I feel confident and value my practice more now than I did twelve months ago.

I will pass on the knowledge I have through workshops and am developing a timetable for the first half of 2018.

I have been able to meet, engage in productive conversations and learn new printing techniques from more of my influencers and peers than initially planned.

Without the bursary I simply did not have the financial resources to embark on the visits.

Joining The British Printing Society has opened up my network and given me access to advice, journals, conventions and a collection of historical reference material through the Small Printer Publication and I aim to join the collaborative BPS Publishing Group and another small but fascinating project ‘Glint Club’ this year.

As part of the annual Christmas Letterpress Exchange I now share and receive original work from Letterpress printers all over the world.

In 2018 the centenary of Womens Suffrage I want to research Women printmakers over the centuries and the printed poster as an activists tool.

I will be continuing with this blog as the project has inspired me and led me to ask more questions about how to sustain my craft in the technical world. I have SO much to learn but so much to share about the beautiful, tactile process of Letterpress printing.

More information on this wonderful place HERE

Open by appointment and a £5.00 fee enables you to photograph items within.

A print specimen book from my home town – something to look further into

On my visits I stayed at GREEN ROOMS in Wood Green. I can recommend this super little hostel that hosts exhibitions and events in its ground floor bar. A great location opposite Wood Green Tube Station. Dormitories are available but I stayed in a single room, doubles are available too. Discount is given to artists.

Thank you to PIXEL PRESS and NEW NORTH PRESS for their generous invitation and spending time answering my questions and exploring their studios. I was in awe!

I was questioning my ability before I was awarded this bursary on many levels.

Humbled by my peers words of encouragement and advice and the technical knowledge freely imparted I realised early on that taking part in a single course was not the best use of this bursary but to concentrate on the proposed visits and research was the way to underpin and improve it.

I could gain the ‘hands on’ technical knowledge I wanted by my visits and the real value was gleaning this information from not one institution but through many knowledgable individuals.

I have to thank Graham Moss from INCLINE PRESS for his invaluable advice and support.

After my trip to St Brides in London, I reflected on the distance travelled by exhibitors and visitors to the Wayzgoose (myself included). I asked myself:

Do I have to travel to the Capital in search of Letterpress activity and gatherings? Were there opportunities closer to home?

The changes in printing methods needed for sharing information and the ways in which we access this information has changed dramatically since the last century.
The massive news rooms employing hundreds of compositors setting the followings days headlines and stories in sticks and hot metal have disappeared. As well as publishing houses, presses and smaller local printers they replaced (and the vast majority sadly destroyed) the old with new litho and digital trickery. So seeing Letterpress Printing ‘in action’ is rarer than it was.

There are however a few artists* that have not changed their processes, despite the new technology who have continued to use type to create their printed wares and more still that work with the old and the new side by side. (Using Polymer/Magnesium printing plates on vintage presses)

A few still print short stories and poems, sharing type or even having new founts cast. A handful of foundries still exist creating new type and melting worn/damaged sorts to cast ‘new’ if the molds (matrices) are still available and in good condition.

So we do have to travel further but in June 2017 the inaugural Shipley (Bradford) Wayzoose happened and also the first Baskerville Wayzgoose (in Clyro, Hereford) did too. Other Wayzgooses (??) in Bristol, Birmingham, Whittington (Cheltenham) and according to this lovely ARTICLE (which explains the history and mystory of this tradition) GRIMSBY are annual events already so it was heartening to hear of these new celebrations starting to happen.

I was excited to visit the Shipley celebration as I was a fan of Nick Loaring’s work with THE PRINT PROJECT and he had organised the event in his home town.

Smaller in scale than the St Brides event the enthusiasm was matched by the people in attendance who were in the majority based in the North of England and delighted to have the opportunity to meet and gather with their peers and view work created using the process.

The positive feedback means this will happen again in 2018 and I will be applying to take part.

I also chatted to fellow printers about the the possibility of setting up a branch of the BPS as the nearest group was Shropshire and would we benefit form a Northern/North West cohort?

Once again this offered me the chance to catch up with fellow Letterpress printers only known and admired through the power of social media. And how lovely that the feeling seemed mutual.