I am a senior lecturer in Visual Communication at Staffordshire University. I divide my time between teaching, parenting, designing, illustrating and printmaking.
As an educator I have been re-establishing an experimental print workshop and embedding its instruction into the course curriculum. I am a strong advocate for contemporary visual communicators to be exposed to traditional craft-based mediums - to enhance skill and understanding of the roots of the profession. This provides a healthy balance and complement to digital skills and new technology, yielding the opportunity to experiment with hybrid processes.
Coming from a creative family I was encouraged to draw and craft from an early age. My father taught ceramic design and my mother designed children’s clothes. They would both design, paint and craft in their spare time. I realise how lucky I have been to have had parents that valued and encouraged creativity. It brings such joy!
In the 1970’s I spent most weekends at my grandparent’s grocery shop. I was surrounded by tactile and printed ephemera; paper and packaging, hand-painted signage, rubber stamps, brands and labels, bold display typography, Letterpress embossed on bulky papers.
This all rubbed off on me and so I went to art college where my passion for printmaking emerged. I didn’t discover letterpress until later in my working life when I was fortunate enough to come across a Farley proofing press (since refurbished) and a handful of wooden type, and so discovered the craft and beauty that comes from hand-set movable type.
Printmaking Process:
The reinvention of letterpress has since opened up new creative possibilities through the production of illustration-based prints from photopolymer plates, allowing me to combine all of my interests in one process. Starting with the hand-drawn on paper, I fine-tune my images on a Macintosh. The print plates are then created from a digital file and individually hand-printed onto cotton and recycled papers using a vintage press. A second colour is introduced either by isolating areas of the plate and hand-inking each area (a fiddly process) or through chine-colle (a technique in which paper of a different color or texture is adhered to the overall piece). Each print is therefore unique.
Concerned with sustainable practice I use a hand pulled refurbished press, recycled and cotton paper stock and clean mostly with vegetable oil.
Illustration & Design Practice:
After winning a D&AD student award and a scholarship for achievement I graduated with distinction from an MA in Graphic Design & Illustration at BIAD in 1992 - the study of which focused on visual teaching aids for adult literacy. This work prompted a variety of freelance commissions in collaboration with educational publishers and design studios.
I enjoy working on a variety of commissioned and personal projects, digital and analogue, with drawing at the heart; conceptual illustrations, typographic designs and animation sequences.