For our next foray into lino we’ve decided to go big. Now I have to admit I’m not really one to cut stencils and usually leave that up to the other half of id-iom but recently whilst tidying up in the studio I found an unopened package. It turns out it was some A2 size bits of lino. This was perfect as we’d just done some small lino cuts a couple of weeks ago.
Unlike cutting stencils I have managed to smash this one out without a single complaint about my sore fingers. Saying all that it does take a while though and am not quite finished yet. How we go about making the actual print at that size is currently still a mystery. When it’s all done you’ll be the first to know…
Out of all the pieces of canvas we found this was the most complete with a somewhat creepy face that the other half of id-iom just did not like. After a few minutes of discussion on what we were going to do we decided we were going to go abstract although we had no concrete plans on how we were going to go about achieving this.
We find the easiest way to proceed when you have no plan is to just start and see where it takes you. This can lead to some unfortunate circumstances however…
On the journey to abstraction we had to start somewhere so our first idea was to turn the piece into a half man, half pineapple kind of thing. Luckily this idea didn’t hang around too long before the other half of id-iom decided to become a bit of a can killer and pierce any almost-empty cans we had hanging around the studio.
Whilst, it was fun we had clearly gone too far by this point. So we gave into the inevitable and went back to rescuing some of the face. With a little finesse and a whole lot of luck we set about trying to pull this canvas back from the brink. A square stencil here or there, pulling the face forward and pushing the abstracted area into the background I give you ‘I see faces. Even when trying not to’.
Gary was just like you and me until the day he accidentally wandered through a field of genetically modified flowers and became ‘Nosegay’ with the ability to grow the most amazing alien-looking bouquets of flowers right from his fingertips. Now, whilst this wasn’t very helpful when it came to fighting supervillains it did give him a certain celebrity appeal. Which he revelled in. His client list was quite something to behold.
Despite this, his newfound wealth, and his access to jaw droppingly beautiful women he had repeatedly failed to impress any of them into going on a date with him. He imagined it was because he was ‘vertically challenged’ but in reality it was because he was arrogant and boring. Sadly he’d never have the insight to realise it…
This piece is based on an old sketch and is on a big bit of reclaimed canvas that was originally about 5 metres wide but had to be cut down into a slightly more manageable size. Which wasn’t really manageable at all. It’s now been rolled up so long that it’s no longer really viable as an actual canvas. Why I did it so large in the first place I’m not quite sure.
Perhaps I’ll go and grab a smaller canvas and paint it again. That would mean that I have to take myself to the art shop though which is never an action to take lightly as who knows what I’ll come back with.
It’s funny what turns up when you’re having a look through old photos. I must have just snapped this in the moment and then completely forgotten about it. It’s the cut out piece from a stencil we used when creating a gift for our cousin’s wedding and I just think the composition of the photo somehow hits the spot. Which is nice for something that is usually just discarded.
I like it enough to have it as the background image on my phone. So there.
Now this is a bit of a weird one for us. We usually like to stick some pithy words or a face on any pictures we do, don’t ask me why, we just do it would seem. This is why this piece remains something of a mystery.I was in the studio making what I thought would be a spiffy background for us to work on when the other half of id-iom comes in and says he likes it as is. That was enough to make me stop and ponder what he was talking about. This contemplation sadly went on for about 6 months longer than expected…
I was looking for some gold leaf when I came across this canvas again and, would you Adam & Eve it, I suddenly beheld what the other half of id-iom had seen all that time ago. So, before we potentially do anything else with it we thought it probably deserved to see the light of day.
The main, pertinent and only real question you should be asking yourself right now is ‘is that a googly eye?’ I’ve done my research and can guarantee you it isn’t.
Just yesterday the other half of id-iom asked why I was using a googly eye as a weight to hold down a stencil. I told him I wasn’t but he didn’t believe me until I lifted up the much painted tuppence coin in question and showed him. He still didn’t believe me even after I had put the coin back down. So there you have it. People will believe what they want.
It’s happened to the best of us, there we are with the will to get on the good foot and do the bad thing but all too late we realise we don’t have any paint to hand. What does an intrepid graffiti artist do? They refer to rule No.1 in the id-iom Graffiti Survival Handbook, which is ‘use whatever you can to make your mark’.
In this instance it was a power washer and a dirty patio that we had before us. The game was afoot. In scant seconds we had a figure emerging from the dirt. Then, in the name of our mum’s health and safety buffed our own work and the rest of the patio. Seriously, it was so slippery it was a broken arm just waiting to happen. Look after your mum.
As an artist who can let their imagination get the best of them, it’s no surprise that sometimes things can get out of hand…
Many months ago now, possibly even years ago, I was working on this painting when an errant idea popped into my head which managed to satisfy the Muse and derail my entire train of thought. Needless to say I needed to please the Muse which meant me putting this canvas aside to work on my shiny new idea.
There it lay until just recently whilst having a rummage around for an entirely unrelated item and it appears in my hands. For now, I’ve got no idea where I was heading with this piece so any suggestions would be welcome. Otherwise I’ll just have to wait until the Muse has finished with Margaret, aged 9 from Dumfries, who has some Christmas based art homework to finish for tomorrow…
When you do commissions you always hope for the best but plan for the worst and this was the outcome of one of the bad times. We’d found the perfect colour to use but we later found out this was the last colour we should have used. After we had finished and dropped the piece off to the client we got a message back saying some of the spray paint was coming off the wood. We thought they must be mad as spray paint magically seems to go on anything or so we thought. Little did we know that the neon colours we used were made using some different type of alchemy to be produced and resulted in the paint flaking off the wood we were painting. After we got the piece back and started the remedial work needed to get the piece back to looking its best I happened to take these shots. Pretty but i must not forget it came out of disaster
We here at id-iom occasionally like to go into the lab to create some new and wonderful things. Last Christmas when we couldn’t go and see our family due to the coronavirus we decided that our present giving for 2021 should be stellar and how better to do that than create some one-off personalised wrapping paper.
Like two mad scientists from the 50’s we came up with ideas ranging from gold plated newspaper (the cheaper newspaper was to offset the price of the gold) to woven cat fur cloth with added glitter (not ideal due to allergies). Eventually we decided to screen print some blank newsprint with cats, guns and grenades on as we thought this was the perfect sentiment for Christmas – and for gift giving in general. Now we just need some gifts…
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