Valerie O’Regan-
Title : Steel Drums Vacation Nation
Medium: Toned Cyanotype Print with red cabbage and rusty nail ink on Kinwashi Awagami paper.
Price : POA
National Graphic
1953
Volume CIII
Number One
About the artwork:
The image title from the page from the National Geographic ‘Steel Drums, Homemade from oil Barrels, Fill the air with clanger’ was a fantastic prompt to inspire my artwork. I loved the rounded shapes of the drum barrels, the raised ridges on the sides and the striped and U-shaped patterns painted on the surface of the drums. The home-made instruments recycled dented and tempered were the main influence in the making of this work. I cut stencils and made these into photograms to place on top of coated Japanese awagami paper called Kinwashi, a beautiful organic paper made with hemp fibres. I coated the Kinwashi with UV light sensitive emulsion. After exposure and first wash out bath I bleached and toned my print and let dry before adding my homemade inks of rusty nail and red cabbage echoing the rusty tones of the drum surface and original steel blue colour of the barrel.
About Valerie:
My practice has always been inspired by the natural environment exploring the conceptual and material interpretation of landscapes. My imagery is site responsive. My intention is to characterise and articulate the experience of ‘place’ in a specific moment in time as I move within in, gathering imprints both physical and experiential. The environment breathes, consumes and narrates.Drawing, photographing, collage, printmaking and the layering of several processes on paper follows and responds to this notion of the surrounding landscape having the same layering, the same collage of contrasting processes and functions. Living in Innellan on the boundaries of Dunoon and Toward I am surrounded by coastline and forestry, these ancient landscapes traced and tracked with shifting markers of past and present lives, has been a generous source of inspiration since March 2020. Over the last year (2021) I have investigated the use of solar plate etching techniques with cyanotype printmaking combining both processes on Japanese handmade papers, recycled cotton and linen fabrics resulting in a series of unique prints gallery ready that I have exhibited throughout 2021 nationally and internationally.