Today’s artist for #cjs20 is Birgit Koopsen, whose wonderfully colourful gelli art tutorials I follow on YouTube. This project really appealed to me because I’m a gelli plate fan, so always looking for new ways to use my tools, and it didn’t disappoint. I’ll be using the process again and experimenting with the possibilities.
I love scrapbooking. It might not be ‘trendy’ anymore, but I enjoy recording our lives, documenting what I know of old photos, and generally playing with paper, scissors & glue. I was a tutor for a national scrapbooking company so had access to all the newest supplies; one of my favourites was Basic Grey
I was tidying up some supplies today and found my stash of old letters. Some of the self-adhesive ones aren’t any more. and I had quite a lot of Basic Grey heavy paper letters left. All the useful letters like a, e & s are long gone, and I’m left with a pile of g, x and q!
I was going to throw them out but suddenly realised I could repurpose them. Out with my 16×20 Gelli plate and some Gold Open acrylics. I put down one colour, then used the letters as masks and pulled a print – the yellow one shows what this looks like. I removed the letters, put down a fresh colour, more letters and overprinted; I did three layers on each.
The page that looks a bit like old leather is where I pulled the leftover paint off the plate each time. I’m not sure what I will do with these yet, but like the look, and have tucked the paint covered letters away to use another day.
I taught an art journal class on Thursday night and a gelli print class on Saturday in Greymouth, through Left Bank Art Gallery. The classes were held at CoRe, a fantastic community facility run by Cassandra Struve, one of those people who has so much passion for community development and can see the possibilities then act on them.
Some of the people who attended didn’t want to be photographed, which is fine, so these photos are entirely representative. People seemed to get a lot out of it and enjoy the processes. I had brunch with Penny Kirk yesterday and spotted a women who had attended the gelli class. I said hi and she told me she’s already turning her gelli prints into cards and will be buying her own gelli plate.
I’m already talking with Cassandra about running more classes in the new year, taking people to the next level with art journals and printing. As I said to Tony this morning, it’s funny that when you travel away you quite often get more support than at home. Perhaps when you’re local people assume you don’t have much to offer, or figure they can catch you any time?
Here’s a few photos of the classes and what people created. Enjoy!
Some of the gelli prints I did yesterday *needed* me to do some more work on them 😉
I’m using hand painted papers as collage materials to add circles. I suspect they echo the rocks I saw at Hokitika Gorge but I’m not sure. That’s the thing with my art process – it’s intuitive and iterative. The first few tentative works in a series and the final pieces are often worlds apart and, for many people, the final works have little or no relation to the initial inspiration. And I’m totally ok with that.
The collaged shapes are very specific. I have quite large sheets of randomly painted papers and when I cut a shape it is carefully chosen for the colours. Then I test the shape on the base work and sometimes trim a millimeter or two off here and there, more than once, before it feels right!
What I know of this Hokitika series is there’s some distinct colours, lines and shapes that are appearing over and over again. I’m still working quite small – these are about 6″ square – but will work bigger eventually.
I love gelli printing, and have taught it in the past. I’m going to be teaching it again this winter, in Greymouth, and am really looking forward to it. I may do some more classes here in South Taranaki too.
In the meantime, I have a joint exhibition booked for the Lysaght Watt Gallery in October with Dimmie Danielwski – I’ll be using some existing works but also making a new body of work based on my visit to the Hokitika Gorge last year.
With those two things in mind, I’ve been doing some gelli printing. I’ll use the captions to explain what these are.
Multiple layers using stencils.
Multiple layers using stencils.
Using a final layer of paint to pull all the leftover texture off the plate.
A more painterly approach, using a brayer and the end of a paint brush.
A more painterly approach, using a brayer and the end of a paint brush.
Single layer print using a gel texture plate.
Single layer print using a gel texture plate.
Done using a brayer, and lifting small amounts of paint off at a time. This probably isn’t complete; I’m likely to do more mark-making into it yet. This is very much Hokitika Gorge inspired.
Done using a brayer, and lifting small amounts of paint off at a time. This probably isn’t complete; I’m likely to do more mark-making into it yet. This is very much Hokitika Gorge inspired.
Done using a brayer, and lifting small amounts of paint off at a time. This probably isn’t complete; I’m likely to do more mark-making into it yet. This is very much Hokitika Gorge inspired.
Done using a brayer, and lifting small amounts of paint off at a time. This probably isn’t complete; I’m likely to do more mark-making into it yet. This is very much Hokitika Gorge inspired.
In November I spent a few days in Greymouth and Hokitika, and visited Hokitika Gorge. The shapes and colours have invaded my mind & are appearing in my art.
When I did my final (4th) year at The Learning Connection a few strong marks emerged, including a sort of curved power pole with a cross beam, normally in cream. (I can’t find an image of these works anywhere)
I’m finding those marks have reappeared in a new form – this time as a cross with some tiny hatchmarks near it, a cross and some hatchmarks inside a circle, and a curved pair of parallel lines with a cross beam. The circle / oval are featuring too, and are fairly new to me in terms of consistent use.
I’ve shown below some works from 2008, and some of the new works I’ve been doing, which are gelli prints as a base with mark making in subsequent layers. Looking at these, the connection between the 2008 marks, and today’s marks, isn’t as obvious as I thought it would be …
(in other news, I think my scanner glass needs a good clean)
I’ve spent a couple of hours today making more gelli prints using stencils, masks, stamps and bubble wrap. What do I do with them? I use them for collage, in my art journals, card making and even in finished art works. Some of them will end up with more paint, crayon, pen etc over the top yet.
I love Rae’s art, having met her through Documented Life etc. I was super excited about trying her technique … and it wouldn’t work for me 😉 I think the crayons I have just weren’t waxy enough to resist properly. That said, I got some fabulous prints and loved some of her ideas for getting interesting marks using a Gelli plate. I have shared my fav, and it’s ghost print, below.
I keep a stack of cards ready for sending out, and my stock had got a bit low. Yesterday I made some gelli prints just for the fun of it, mainly using Golden Open Acrylics and a variety of stencils. Today I decided to turn them into 10 fairly all-purpose greeting cards. I used my latest stamp and die set from Simon Says Stamp for some of them – love it.
I had a quick play with my 5×7″ card size and 4×4″ round gelli plates late this afternoon. I used Daler Rowney paints and a bunch of stencils. This is my fav print from the bunch; I like the happy mix of colour and scraps of pattern.
Cath Sheard 