This blog begins in June 2017 with a 6 month research and development project focussed on developing skills, technical ability and confidence in printmaking and creative digital manufacturing techniques.
I’ve been awarded an a-n professional development bursary to access technical support, training, and equipment at the St Barnabas Press and community workshop Make Space, in Cambridge.
This period of research will help me to build a peer network of artists and creative technologists, with the longer term aim of developing future collaborations and exhibition opportunities
I’ll be the Caravanserai Artist in Resident at Cambridge Artworks from 3 – 23rd July. This will be my home!
During my residency I will be conducting a period of fieldwork to collect visual and topographical information from the surfaces surrounding me, including the interior of the caravan; the roads and pavements in the surrounding area; and the surfaces within the the Cambridge Artworks studio building. I will be producing a set of experimental printing plates and painting studies based the material gathered.
Do come and see me – I’ll be here for Cambridge Open Studios 2018 during first 3 weekends of July. I’ll be posting updates throughout the residency.
Saturday 5th – Sunday 6th May 2018
In May 2018 I was invited to be a resident artist on the Suffolk Soundcamp along with Fred Bungay, Kyle Kruse and Neil Stringfellow, by artist and curator Daniella Kay Ash.
The Suffolk Soundcamp took place at Gunton Warren Nature Reserve and was an opportunity to record new sounds, and explore ways of creating new work in response to or using sound.
Lowestoft’s first annual Sound Art Residency, the Suffolk Soundcamp, was part of an international network of listening points recording at sunrise on International Dawn Chorus Day. The sounds of daybreak were streamed live from the Suffolk Camp to a 24 hour broadcast relayed live by audio streamers which tracked the sun around the globe at daybreak.
My practice is focussed on landscape surfaces and the natural and human influenced degradation of them. Using my time on this residency to explore the nature reserve I have focussed on the unfixed and granular surface of the beach and sand dunes. I made sound recordings of the what it sounds like to walk on these surfaces and will be converting the sounds into visual forms. Using a combination of 3d printing and traditional printmaking techniques I am developing a series of printing plates based on these representations, and will update soon with progress.
More Soundcamp info here: http://soundtent.org/soundcamp_about.html
Very happy to be featured on the a-n blogs twitter header, thanks a-n!
The featured working image (here: https://twitter.com/an_artblogs?lang=en) is a scan of the Gwydir Street pothole which I’ve used to create a series of 3d printed plates. The 3d plates replicate the topography of the pothole in detail to produce prints which explore both the 2 dimensional shape of the pothole – the surface image, as well as the 3 dimensional contours – the structure of the hole. I’m producing a series of diptychs and will post more images asap as they progress.
Heres a couple more mini prints in progress from other holes and road cracks:
I’m writing up my research report which details working methods, and video documentation, and have produced workshop outlines for 2018.
The past 6 months have been hugely important for my practice. It has allowed me to develop my printmaking practice and experiment with creative manufacturing technologies. Without the bursary I wouldn’t have been able to financially commit to weekly printmaking sessions or access 3d printing and laser cutting machinery, or buy the necessary materials for producing and exhibiting my work. I have met some very interesting people, rebuilt my creative network in Cambridge and I hope that there will be opportunities to collaborate on projects in the new year.
I’m now working on a new body of work for exhibition in 2018 and will be submitting proposals to exhibition spaces and entering national and international open calls. I’ll be posting more progress throughout 2018.
Happy New Year everyone and thank you A-N for the support!
I’m very pleased that two images from my Gifts series are on show at Hot Numbers in Cambridge
This project documents the ‘gifts’ my daughter gave me during toddling walks in 2016 – 2017. Sometimes a gift would be a large beautiful intricate stone, or sometimes a handful of dusty gravel. She was always so pleased to choose something and give it me, so they are all saved, individually labelled and gradually being documented as ‘Martha’s Gifts 2016 – 2017’.
The prints are on view from 12 December 2017 – 4 February 2018 at the Open Exhibition Hot Numbers, Dales Brewery, Gwydir Street, Cambridge CB1 2LJ
More info on the series here: http://jennimain.co.uk/2017/12/11/gifts/
