It's easy when you know how

I promised to tell you all about my visit to Kettles Yard in Cambridge yesterday . . .

The current exhibition in the gallery space is 'Bridget Riley: Colours, stripes, planes and curves', which I enjoyed greatly; there were a few working drawings, some smaller scale gouache paintings and many large canvasses – all wonderful compositions of colour against colour.

But, what most delighted me was the views through the gallery, with glimpses of parts of paintings seen from oblique angles – which makes the flat paintings become optical sculptures.

Of course, the main reason for me being in Kettles Yard yesterday afternoon, was to see the master Chinese printmaker Yu Chengyou demonstrate his water-based woodcut printing techniques.

Yu Chengyou swiftly got down to work and his translator explained that his home in Heilongjiang in north-east China right on the Russian border is where his inspiration comes from. Printmaking became a major means of expression among the artists in this remote area, as oil painting was seen to be a 'western' medium and this traditional way of working was revived. There was another reason this art-form was popular . . . the materials and equipment needed are relatively cheap and easy to get hold of:
 

  -   plywood (from a builder's merchant/DIY store – a good fine grained wood like birch, about 8mm thick)
  -   chisels
  -   paper (rice paper or cotton rag, slightly absorbant surface)

  -   water in spray bottle (to dampen the paper and water down the paint)
  -   a sheet of plastic (protects the paper from burnisher and stops paper drying out)

  -   bull-dog clips (to hold the paper in position on the block)

  -   water colour paint (tubes of normal painter's water colour)

  -   brushes (good quality flat ones in a selection of size)

  -   burnisher (a cylindrical piece of plastic, or tubing is good)

And that's it!

Oh, and imagination, creativity, skill and 30 years practice, come in handy too!

Right, then, on with the demonstration of how to do a multi-block water-based woodcut print . . . you'll see Yu Chengyou's hand and brush are blurred in most of these photo – he works very quickly!

In three stages, the first colour has been applied and pressed lightly with the hand to give the speckled texture. The paper has been attached to the second block and the second colour is applied to it . . .

And now the third block, which has the fine detail, is painted with the darker colour . . .

and printed . . .

Instead of printing all the paper in an edition of prints with the first colour, before moving on to the next colour; Yu Chengyou completes a print (all the colours) before starting the next print. No need to have lots of space to hang drying prints, there's only one drying at any time so you can work in a small space!

There was a short discussion about whether we'd like to have a go a printing or see another demonstartion – the consensus was to watch the master at work again (I was itching to have a go!)

This time it's a beautiful intricate carving of a flower, here it is being painted with a pale soft grey . . .

A tiny detail of yellow is added in the centre of the larger flower before moving on to block two, the background . . .

A piece of scrap paper is used to protect the print while it is being rubbed hard with the burnisher . . .

The same block and same colour paint is printed again to get a more intense colour . . .

Now the third and last block, details of leaves to print over the blue background . . .

And there we have it, one beautiful print finished!

It's amazing what you can do in two hours when you know how!

Thank you to ArtChina and St Barnabas Press for inviting Yu Chengyou to show his great skill and unpretentious art here in the UK and arranging such an inspiring workshop.

I'm off to the builder's merchant tomorrow to buy ply-wood ;-)

Celia

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