Category: Artquest 30 in 30

Artquest 30/30 Day 12 ‘Force a change in your practice’

 Today’s hint, which I can ignore, is ‘Force a change in your practice’. I can only think that the @artquestlondon robots are reading my Instagram posts and noted my wittering on about test strips yesterday! It probably is time for a change, but how do I force it or has it already been forced upon me? However, having spent days working on test strips, changing the curves on negatives and doing more test strips, I finally have something I’m almost happy with so the change will take place tomorrow.

Thus was made from the last sheet of Fabriano 50% cotton that I sensitised for the test strips I made yesterday as I’m very aware that the slightest change in any of the variables will result in a change in the final print. It was exposed at 4 1/2 minutes using my Everbeam 100 watt UV lamp. The Church spire is still not quite right but I was relatively happy with it until I spotted a major problem.

I hadn’t cut the watermark off the bottom of the paper before exposing the print. How frustrating!!! Sometimes it really is time for a change, but for now, this is my day 12 submission.

A bit of catching up to do.

I have kept up with my art projects over the last week, now 10 days in for the Artquest 30/30 challenge and 5 weeks in for Bobbin Along. Artquest 30/30 first.

Each day. Artquest give a hint which can be used as inspiration or ignored and to be honest, I don’t always find the hints work that well for photography, at least not what I want to do. However, whether it is maybe my brain is becoming attuned or just more open minded, for the last couple of days. I have found something I thought worked.

For day 7 of the 30/30 challenge, the hint was a day in your life. for this I chose a photo I took a couple of years ago in Wester Ross, the one I had used for cyanotype test strips a couple of days previously. I wasn’t terribly happy with the resulting cyanotypes. Two were over exposed and the other ok ish. I bleached the over overexposed images and toned 1 of them, then wove them together with the original photograph and entitles the resulting image ‘4 Seasons in a Day’ which you frequently get in Wester Ross.

I’m not sure that weaving the cyanotypes with the original image was entirely successful and can only think this is at least in part due to shrinkage when cyanotypes are continually washed.

Day 8 hint was easier and again I delved into my archive of photographs. The hint was ‘Triangle, cross, circle, square’ and for this I chose a photo that I had taken a few years ago for a camera club competition.

I cut the photo into a square with the circular missor in the centre, then cut from corner to corner making 4 triangles and places some dark card underneath to make a cross. I wish they were all that simple!

Artquest 30/30 Day 1 done

Phew, first one under my belt. Very experimental and still slightly damp so I’m not sure what it will look like when completely dry tomorrow and far less when it will be woven with another cyanotype later in the day.

So my first challenge was to bleach and tone a cyanotype print, the intention being that I will weave it with another untoned image tomorrow. with hindsight I should maybe have copied this image before toning so that I could weave a toned and untoned version of the same image but I didn’t do that.

They are the same subject matter and the same size so we’ll see how it works!

The bleaching and toning process was very experimental, there are so many variables you never really know how it will turn out, a bit like making wet cyanotype prints. I used plain chlorine bleach which is quite harsh and can break down the fibres so needs to be used sparingly. After an hour there was no change in the colour of the print so I added a little more and finally after 4 and a half hours I was happy with the result. There was still quite a lot of blue in the image which would result in a darker shade once toned but I was happy with that.

I used green tea to tone the image, 10 teabags left to stew in 250 mls boiling water for 10 minutes and then another litre of cool water added. Research tells me not to use earl grey tea as it contains quite a lot of oil which prevents the paper from absorbing the colour. The tea I used was flavoured with mint and I worried that this might cause a problem too but it doesn’t appear to have been an issue. The print was left face down in the brew for about 30 minutes before I was happy with the results. As can be seen, there is quite a pint tinge to the highlights but I’m happy with that for now. Tomorrow’s job, once the print is completely dry, is to slice each print and weave them together. Exciting stuff!

Kickstarting my creativity

I seem to have been stuck for a long time, dabling in this and that but not going anywhere. Over the past 12 months I’ve been doing a bit of patchwork and quilting, a little ICM and some infrared photography but cant really settle to anything. It was at a quiliting workshop that the tutor mentioned that she was starting a 52 week stitching challenge with Anne Brooks. Each week thoughout the year, Anne gives a new prompt and releases a short video showing how she interprets in in stitching; this year the prompts will all be words. The idea is that you build up the work over a 12 month period. This is way out of my comfort zone as my preferred mode of working is to know, or at least have an idea what I will end up with. But, I have signed up to ‘Bobbin along’. The second kick was an email from Artquest reminding us of their annual challenge, 30 in 30, whereby we have to create and upload a new piece of work evrey day for 30 days starting 1st February, today. I signed up to that too though not really confident that I could do both but as both as small amounts of work, why not?

So, where will I find the time? Well, most mornings I have a second cup of tea after breakfast and sit with my iPad for an hour. What a wasted hour! Surely I can use that hour to better effect somewhere in the day.

How will I approach these challeges? Bobbin along is relatively easy, if uncomfortable. We have one work to respond to each week. The first was layers, the second loops, then rolls, then hummock and this week’s word is wrinkles. Anne shows us via a video how she interprets in and how her work is building and we all follow suit. Some weeks it might take an hour and some maybe just 15 minutes, its up to us. There is a forum and a Facebook page so you can see how others have approached it and you can take inspiration from that or do something completely different. Watch this space!

Artspace 30 in 30 is slightly more challenging. For one thing, you must upload a new piece of art each day and if you miss a day you are out. I’m not a great decision maker so where do I start? I’m not confident enough with the stitching malakry to opt for that as I will probably spend more time unpicking than anything else so it has to be photography related. I’m probably not going to be able to go out and take new photos every day but I do have an archive of images I’ve done nothing with including lots of infrared photographs I haven’t processed and a pile of cyanotypes that have sat in a corner of my study for months, some years and that’s where I’m going to start. Much of this will be experimental though, it may work or it may not but isn’t that what art is all about?