My press is up and running!

I bought a second hand etching press two or three months ago but it's taken me all this time to clear a space to set it up to work in.  Finally there!!  There's barely enough room here, but works for the time being.

I have been working away slowly this year with not a great deal to show - cutting lino plates for my artist's book for BAO Edition 4, A girl waiting.  Now the press is up and running I've started printing them. These are some of the places the girl might be waiting.  The girl and her reason for waiting to come.

  I think I'm going to love having my own press!

First post for the year!

When I've left it so long between posts, it becomes more and more difficult to do so.... Will I start with all my excuses...?  Not, this time.    So, I'll just wish all my bloggy friends a happy, productive and fulfilling 2013.
 Haven't made much progress on work to show you, although I have seen a few exhibitions about which I could have written. I enjoyed Elizabeth Banfield's solo exhibition at red gallery, and actually bought a print.  Very happy to have it!  Her work is very beautiful.
Also enjoyed BAZE at Handheld Gallery which has work by a number of you. The gallery reopens next Wednesday, so you could pop in if you are in Melbourne, and catch the end of this - a fabulous exhibition of zines and artist's books.
I should also mention the highlight of my recent exhibition viewing experiences.  I'm not sure whether I've mentioned before that I work in Visitor Services at Heide Museum of Modern Art.  I am so loving soaking up the fabulous Louise Bourgeois exhibitions - Late Works and Louise Bourgeois and Australian Artists - lots of fabric sculptures, fabric drawings, works on paper and the huge spider.  Perhaps because I'm a printmaker and artist who loves working with text, my favourite work is a suite of prints called What is the shape of this problem? -  nine diptychs, letterpress text panels paired with abstract lithographs, intense doodling/patterning (like I do when I'm on the phone).  'The telephone call from the slammer' is the panel that still makes me wobbly just to think about.  The first time I stood in front of the work I got very wobbly indeed!  It's intensely emotive, for me, and quite beautiful. Text fragments from 'The papillion, the ray of hope' and 'To unravel a torment you must begin somewhere' to 'The hour is devoted to revenge'...all very powerful and moving.  The exhibitions are highly recommended!
And just so as this post is not all text here are a couple of proofs of prints for my BAO book, which is very much a work in progress. I am making a book titled A girl waiting.  These are places that a girl might be waiting.... A tram stop in High Street, Northcote,

 the waiting room at Tamworth Station.

And outside Westgarth cinema, Northcote.

The girl and her reasons for waiting are to come.

Work in progress - Cats!

 

 

Some hand-printed proofs of the beginnings of a body of work, A Taxonomy of Cats.

A lover of cats, I've noticed that there are a lot of images of cats in art. Here, the cats are taken out of their context and classified in a faux 'scientific' taxonomy - walking cats, curled, sleeping, sitting up tall or cleaning themselves.  Hunting cats are probably next.  I'm thinking of presenting them as a large educational/scientific poster.  This is one part of an exhibition I'm planning for next year...The Obsessions of  Woman of a Certain Age(!)  The other obsession is Leonard Cohen.  Going for a bit of alliteration...Cohen and Cats!!

 

 

An Inventory of Al-Mutanabbi Street - artist book project

A week or so ago I finally finished and posted off my contribution to the project - An Inventory of Al-Mutanabbi Street - a response to the bombing of Al-Mutanabbi Street - the street of the booksellers in Baghdad - on 5 March 2007. More information about the project can be seen here.

Bagdad reads * Fragments is a collection of linocut printed and typewritten text fragments taken from the history of Baghdad as a centre of learning, from Iraqi poetry and descriptions of the project, An Inventory of Al-Mutanabbi Street.  The words are printed on very light, somewhat transparent paper, suggesting the fragility of the situation for the booksellers of Al-Mutanabbi Street.  The red of the rather messy pastepaper cover also makes reference to the destruction of the bombings.
The first work on which I've used my recently-purchased typewriter...so excited to have a typewriter!

Something I've been making...

It's been much longer than I'd planned since my last post, so I thought I put up a couple of images of something I've been making, as all the other projects I'm working on are still a week or so from having images to show.  So here are some cards I've made recently . Linocut prints on pages of my copy of Jane Eyre (which fell apart when I re-read it earlier this year) and musical score (bought from an Op shop).

and gelatin prints

 

The Vivienne Binns exhibition finished a week or so ago and I was very happy to have it reviewed by Robert Nelson in The Age/Sydney Morning Herald. You can read it here.

 

Vivienne Binns: Art and Life at LUMA

So the exhibition is up and running on its own now.  The opening went well - even though I had public speaking thrust upon me...and that was okay in the end.  I've given a couple of curator's talks and the catalogue is well received.  Now time to relax a little, or focus upon other things.  I'm really happy with it.
Here are a couple of photos from the opening, both taken by my friend, Brian Pieper.

Vivienne Binns speaking about her work, LUMA, July 2012



Vincent Alessi, Creative Director, LUMA and Vivienne Binns, exhibition opening Vivienne Binns: Art and Life.


In terms of my own art, I'm currently working on three projects - my book for the Inventory of Al-Mutanabbi Street, my edition for Book Art Object, working with the title A girl waiting and a project about cats from Art History - working title A Taxonomy of (Art) Cats.  Very soon I plan (Promise?) to post some images of proofs of something here!!

Pay it Forward

This is really a quite belated post.  Back in April I responded to this post by Jac.

I couldn't have put it better.  She said,' One of the things I like about the web is the ability to make connections with people across the globe, the idea of being able to share ideas and techniques and to have a ‘conversation’ with like minded people whom I probably wouldn’t get the opportunity to meet in person'.

Like Jac, I like the idea of sharing not only tecniques, experiments, thoughts and images but also, on a small scale, pieces of ‘real’ work. Which is why I responded to the post.

A couple of days ago I received a very beautiful book called Weave, in the mail from Jac in England. There are images of the book on  her blog, but here is just one...

So now it's my turn to pay it forward.

If you want to join in, this is how it works.

If you leave a comment here I will send the first three people a small handmade gift via snail mail (and post links to those three bloggers). They will then put a post up about Pay It Forward (with a link back to my blog) and will also send on to three more people small  handmade gifts via snail mail etc.etc