Postcard 10: Not a man

I didn't notice this was going to happen until yesterday. I started on Day 1, and have pretty much had my head down working on these in album order. So. Not a Man arrives on the anniversary of Danielle Miller's death. Death was always going to wear a frock in this one. But, in honour of Dani, it's a PROPER FROCK.

I certainly feel I've learnt a lot doing this challenge. And gained in confidence. Putting yourself out there is the life lesson I've learned from Dani. So here I am, doing things I wouldn't have imagined a year ago.

This is the verse to accompany it:

Width of hip and weight of jaw.

Bones to pick to prove your law.

My mysteries are beyond mere science’ play,

So this box I’ll tick, “I prefer not to say.”

Here's the block and proofs. Once I'd got the basics down, it all just flowed. I only added 3 or 4 mrks to finish.

And printed off.

Postcard 9: Medusa (Part 2)

And finished. Only subtly different from the version in Part 1. Think I'm right to leave out drapery and stuff.

The verse that goes with this one is:

The mobs that jeer and spit your name.

None survive their bile and blame.

Take heart as I take you to your rest,

No-one escapes my final test.

Some dainty features in this one which made it a challenge to achieve. And having a suitably sad-looking Death.

Postcard 9: Medusa (Part 1)

A few days ago, whenever it was, when I was working on the background for "Restart from Zero", I wrote alongside some of the sketches I was making, "Medusa. Death as Pieta." That was to remind me of tthe image thatt had just come into my head of Michelangelo's famous sculpture with Death taking Mary's place and Medusa from Cellini's Perseus in the place of Christ. I enlisted these guys to help me cobble the picture together.

Because Cellini's Medusa is quite twisted on the shield and cushion arrangement, I needed a more relaxed lower body for this pose. This is where I've got so far. The upper body and arm is based on Cellini.

I was going to have drapery over whatever it is Death is sitting on, but I'm inclined to leave everything black. But I'm working out how to do a suggestion of blood dripping from the neck into a pool on the floor.

Postcard 8: Night

Done before brekfast!

Sometimes you have a picture so clear in your head, you just execute it. I did the drawings for the head and skull last night. The hand I drew while waiting in the car the day before.

Here are the proofs:

It all came ot pretty much as I wanted, so there was virtually no tweaking of the cuts either. All done before 9am. Tomorrow's is going to be hard, though and I've done no drawings yet. So I need the time.

Postcard 7: Lobotomy

This one has been a bit troublesome. The first version I started  yesterday went a bit wrong. I was a bit too tired to do anything about it due to the sweltering heat, so I started again today.

Here's the verse:

The system rules the lives within,

Decides what's good or bad. Fit in

By removing thought and feeling both.

Brain dead, by my technocratic oath.

The lab coat was my wife's idea. All the bones would have made things far too confusing otherwise. This picture shows progress through some proofs.

And another 12 postcards done

Postcard 6: Another dream

Made an early start today, so got this finished before the heat in my little print room got too high.

Sometimes the idea for a print just comes and doesn't require much work to get it into its final form. Here's the drawing I traced from. That's pretty much it for workings out. ! was going to have the odd little reflection on places like the cheekbone, orbital bome and shoulder blade, but decided against it having done the profile.

I don't think I've posted one of these before, so heres the block, inked with India Ink and sumi-e brush. I'm just beginning cutting death's outline

Here are various proofs.

And the requisite dozen postcards printed off.

Postcard 5: Restart from Zero

Just the one post today. So here's the finished print.

The song is about environmental disaster, the end of the world, really. And starting again from scratch. So here's the verse.

Burning forests, islands sunk,

Critters crawl in piles of junk.

"Stop," you say now, "all is lost."

So start again, but count the cost.

I like the horrible ambiguity of this image. Which one is Death here for? I had various ideas for this one, but all the others were a bit messy. This changed from my original idea, but here's the first sketch I did of this one. Pretty close to the final version, really. And a note at the side so I know roughly what forceps look like.

And this is the version I worked up to trace on to the block.

And drawings of the various other elements.

And twelve copies printed off.

Postcard 4: Castle in the Woods (Part 2)

Here we are. Completed print.

The accompanying verse goes like this:

Rejection and attraction held equally

In tension by your dark psychology.

Aloof and distant from the hum and drum,

Wait in your tower, I will come.

Here's a picture showing the initial proof along with the block in its final state. I did quite a lot of cutting before I printed anything this time, and then did a few with not many differences between.

And 12 copies printed off as usual.

Postcard 4: Castle in the woods (part 1)

Made some reasonable progress this morning, so I'll share some pictures showing how the design developed.

This was my original scribble. The song uses the castle as a metaphor for how hard it is to reach someone in the throes of depression. And if you do manage to reach them, then you're probably not in good shape yourself... So that's kinda where I get this picture of Death as a damsel in distress.

The left hand picture here shows that I changed the design from the battlements to a window. And the right-hand page is a large-scale drawing of the skull. I hung my model skull at the top of a door frame so that it would give me a slightly elevated perspective.

And this is the scaled final version I traced on to the block, which I then inked. Once I do the first proof, most of the ink will wash off, so I need to cut enough away so that I know where I'm going before I print anything. The costume is late fifteenth century fashion. Tall hats and cleavage-revealing dresses, and a bit power-dressing around the shoulders.

Postcard 3: I am an iceberg (Part 2)

Here's the finished article. Really like Death in this one. More your traditional reaper.

The verse for this one goes like this:

The cold force of my fingers rest

Upon your head and arms and chest.

And push you further into deep,

resounding, chilled, forever sleep.

Click here to find the music that inspired this.

Here's a picture of some of the proofs for this one. It was quite late in the process that the broken ice appeared. I was thinking Caspar David Friedrich.

And finally another twelve printed off.

Postcard 3: I am an Iceberg (Part 1)

I had a number of ideas for this one. This one is on a different scale to the ones I've done before and I think conveys something of the violence of the song it's inspired by.

This is the original sketch and the final version I traced on to the block. I'm still thinking about the background/environment. What's in my head is Death pushing her down through broken ice. We shall see how it turns out.

Postcard 2: Pretty Please

Well 2 hours of my day got eaten by having to deal with fly-tiping at the end of our drive. Fly-tippers of course don't bother to sort their rubbish, so I have to. So thank you, Pippa's daddy John.

Anyway, back to the matter in hand. Due to the time shortage I just cracked on and didn't take any photos until I was done. First of all, the finished postcard.

The verse to accompany this one is:

No eyes to see, no lips to call,

Nor ears to listen, no sense at all.

I come to quell your rage, your fear.

Worry not for I come near.

Click here for the music that inspired it

I wanted to achieve different textures between the hair and blindfold and skin. On the whole I'm pretty pleased with it. Here's a photo of the proofs at various stages showing how things progressed.

And another dozen printed off:

Some loose ends from Inappropriate and beginning Pretty Please

A couple of photos I didn't post yesterday, mainly because I forgot to take them off the camera. First of all a the 4 proof prints together. Changes get more subtle as you go along. I think I only added a thin line after the last one.

I decided to print 12 in the end. It wasn't really a decision. It was when I'd pretty much used up the ink I'd squeezed out of the tube. I do scrape it up and put it in a jar, but just using what you've squeezed out is the least wasteful way.

Depending on the brand of ink you use, it stains the bits you've cut from the block to a greater or lesser extent. I used Graphic Chemical ink here. Which stains the cut lino really dark. Lovely ink, though, if expensive. The stuff I'm using was a bargain offer.

Now to Pretty Please. To me, this is a song about not wanting to know about what is going on around you. Hence I'm beginning with this classical statuary hack. More anon.

Postcard 1: Inappropriate (Part 3)

Done it!

The Inappropriate Death. Here's the accompanying verse:

Rules of behaviour, rules of speech,

All unpleasantness out of reach.

But I break the bounds of social nicety

And crash the gates of polite society.

Click here for the music that inspired it

Postcard 1: Inappropriate (Part 2)

First two proofs. Need to be careful now and work out how much more I'm going to cut away.

Postcard 1: Inappropriate (Part 1)

Awake with the birds this morning so I thought I'd make an early start. First things first. If you're going to do a job like this, it helps to have a skull. Well, it belongs to my son, really...

For this first postcard I imagined Death as the drunken uncle who turns up to Christmas dinner and tells the children lewd jokes. An embarrassment to those with better things to do. Here are preliminary sketches and final drawing flipped and copied on to the block

Time for breakfast, I think.

13 Postcards for 13 songs: Day Zero. Prepared

Lino blocks cut and ready. Postcards ready. Sharp tools. Paper. Pencils. Brushes. Ink. All ready.

It occurred to me today, that in order to be properly in the spirit of my artistic forebears in this, each linocut ought to be accompanied by a verse. So I've been amusing myself today making up rhymes about the grim reaper in my head and scribbling them down. So I've now given myself enough of a head start to say I'll do this. So each completed postcard will have its own 4-line verse that may more-or-less scan and rhyme.

Challenging myself: 13 postcards for 13 songs

I've decided to set myself a challenge over the Art Weeks period (20 June to 5 July).

The background story is this. My friends, the Berlin-based band, Feline and Strange, spent much of the last year preparing and recording a new album, financed via crowdfunding and personal loans.

The launch would have been on 4^th April, followed by an extensive tour. Lockdown put paid to all that. The album, “trigger warning” is an unflinching look at aspects of our world: sometimes bleak; sometimes pained; sometimes funny; always uncompromising. Operatic in its scope. I have supported them via Patreon for about 4 years, and feel proud to be a small part of their story. 

Listening to Vanity Fair, the final track on the album, put me in mind of a mediaeval Totentanz, a Dance of Death. The gaunt figure of Death waltzing with the revellers as the band plays...

Then I thought that maybe the whole album was a Totentanz – each song an encounter with Death in his or her many guises.

And also, of course, Death has been among us recently. As someone who succumbed to a maybe-COVID earlier in the year, I've also thought about him/her a lot recently.

So. This is my challenge. During #artweeksfromhome I aim to produce a series of little Deaths. Linocut postcards depicting the Reaper tripping the Light Fandango through our world. Each image drawing on one of the 13 songs on the album.

I will post on this blog as the project unfolds.

MERCH!! BARGAINS!

I know I've flagged this in the last 2 posts, but here are some of the things on offer. Check them out at https://www.shirtee.com/en/kunstopfer/

And for those of you of a quieter nature, here's another design by me at https://www.shirtee.com/en/spacepiano/