Filling The Well

Filling The Well

I have been thinking about my printmaking practice quite a lot the past few days. The reason for this is that over the last few years I have done very few prints because I have been focusing on painting despite that fact that I really love printmaking.

But then I took a major leap of faith and created the Collagraph Master Course. I did this because I had so many people coming to my website trying to find information on how to go about making collagraphs, how to get certain effects and to just be inspired.

There is information out there but nothing that gives the information all in one place and in a way that builds a body of knowledge in a step by step way. I had a lot of knowledge built up over the years that I knew would be really helpful. It would reduce the frustration that happens when things go wrong and you don't know why, and would give people the tools to really transform their work.

I started making the videos and ended up with a course with well over 70 instruction videos, which even amazed me!

While creating test plates showing people how to go about the various techniques I started getting really excited about the medium again but I was frustrated that I didn’t have more current work to share. I had to rely on the large variety of pieces I had done in previous years as examples.

The thing is, my painting style has changed over the years and my printmaking should have too and now be more reflective of my current aesthetic.

The ideal would be to have my printmaking very similar in style to my painting. I am not really into traditional painting and so my printmaking could be much more adventuresome. 

With this in mind I am going to start experimenting with some new approaches and build a body of work that perhaps is closer to my painting and even moves both mediums forward. My mind has been fermenting away with lots of ideas but I am not going to rush to show any early pieces as I want to work into it slowly and experiment a lot.

That brings me to the reason for this post called Filling the Well. We all get stuck in our current way of doing things but one has to constantly fill the creative well to have something to draw from and stimulate our creativity. There are so many ways to do this including taking photos of things that interest us, thinking about what we love and what has meaning for us. More on this in my next post.

Learning new information is a great stimulator too. If you think my Collagraph Master course with the 70 plus videos would help you "fill your well" then do check it out. It will be available again later this year.

Happy creating,

Susanne