Touching Up…

Well I’m back from my hols and as you can see I have a paintbrush in my hand! Not something you often see. I’m actually hand embellishing a canvas print of one of my latest originals, Spring Tide.

This technique, officially known as ‘retouche’ (French - with an accent on the e!) is where embellishments are added to a Giclee print using an array of mediums. Acrylic paint, gold and silver metal leaf, threads, beads, etc are all examples of materials I use. The possibilities (and the fun) are endless. The embellishments are subtle and designed to enhance select features of the work, giving it a little more depth than a standard print. Being canvas, retouche works particularly well for textile art as I’m adding materials to material. For me, this technique has a strong sense of authenticity and I love that each one will be slightly different. I only plan to do a very small number of special edition retouche prints. It’s a lovely way of presenting an art print with an original element and has worked well in the past. I’m rather enjoying playing actually!

The idea is not to dramatically change the appearance of the image, just enhance the textures to create a semi-original effect. I saw some work in a similar style whilst on my holidays recently. It triggered my memory and sparked enthusiasm at the same time!

As you can see, I’ve started quite small. I do actually plan on creating much larger versions in the future but for now this is a perfectly sized experimental piece. It’s actually going so well that I’m going to put this one in a frame and see how it looks. The finished product should be in the studio by Friday- in it’s handsome new frame! Edge West Studio, my creative home, will be reopening this Friday and I’m so looking forward to it.

Going forward, the studio will officially be open every Friday and Saturday, 10-4 and I also plan to be there each Thursday too. Appointments are always possible if you’re not able to make the opening hours.

In the meantime, the fun continues…