Mark Lambert 07/06/2020 Mark Lambert 07/06/2020

Empty

The steep sides of the Pennine valleys are dissected by tracks winding slowly uphill. This image is from one such road that crosses the floor of the Calder valley then climbs towards Warland Reservoir. When I passed this section a couple of years ago, the track was broken in several places, leaving a series of hollows, lined with grit and hard-core, with some hinting at its more usual state.

Warland Road 28 April 2017 14:30 Photo-etching 2020

This plate required several sessions of printing to get right. It took a while to realise that plate itself needed attention. Grinding one side of the plate made for a section of narrower tonal range, which then made under-printing possible.

Warland Road 28 April 2017 14:31 Photo-etching and monoprint 2020

Warland Road28 April 2017 14:31 Photo-etching and monoprint 2019

An afterthought- this series might be seen as a plea for road repairs in a particular place. It is not, rather it draws attention to the way we interact with landscapes. These interactions are not stable. Perhaps to underscore this point, the last time I passed this spot, I can here record this section of track had undergone extensive repair.

Mark Lambert 30/05/2020 Mark Lambert 30/05/2020

Dry

This series is based on a photograph taken whilst walking beside the drain that feeds the Warland Reservoir. On this warm, dry evening, no water was passing through the drain, and the reservoir itself was almost empty.

These seed-heads had dropped onto the middle of the path and as there was hardly a breath of wind, they were spontaneously breaking up where they lay.

This evening walk was very different from my usual experience of Pennine upland paths. They are more usually partially submerged in peaty water, whose surface is broken by fresh winds or obscured through mist or rain.

So this evening seems worth recording.

Warland Drain 24 July 2018 20:20. Photo-etching 2020

The rest of this series is under-printed with monoprint, using hand-ground ink, warming up the final result.

Warland Drain 24 July 2018 20:20. Photo-etching and monoprint 2020

This under-printing also tends to smooth out the image. So, some I have also over-painted with gouache to re-emphasise both the seed-heads and the grittiness of the path.

Warland Drain 24 July 2018 20:20. Photo-etching with monoprint and handpainted detail 2020

Mark Lambert 19/05/2020 Mark Lambert 19/05/2020

Transience and persistence

This series has only one finalised print. Its story is one of persistence. The first prints I made from this plate were unsatisfactory, so I put it to one side. Having worked on different approaches to other images, which I thought would help here, I pulled it our again. However, I couldn’t replicate the crispness and definition achieved in earlier impressions. It took me a whole day of step-wise process alterations to work out the problem. It was the plate being clogged with old, dried out ink. I left the studio thinking the day’s work a failure. Nevertheless, I wrapped up the prints and took them home. The following week I pressed on to correct my error, first cleaning the plate thoroughly.

I didn’t open the first tissue-wrapped prints until I was later pressed to make a quick decision. I was due to visit a former colleague, recently admitted to the nearby St Cuthbert’s hospice. As he was always interested in my artwork, I wanted to show him a few recent representative prints.

On opening the package I had wrapped in the studio, it was clear that my error had become a strength. The indistinct image from the sparsely inked plate was exactly the right treatment for this transient subject. It was one of the half-dozen prints I took to show my colleague, and deserves to stand alone in this collection.

Ash Leaf, Low Laithe Dam 28 May 2018 15:22. Photo-etching and monoprint. 2020

Just to complete the story the later impression of the ‘rectified’ printing is shown below, a far more distinct image, but much less of what had originally impressed me.

Ash Leaf, Low Laithe Dam 28 May 2018 15:22. Photo-etching and monoprint. Proof. 2020

And the the original photo-etching alone:

Mark Lambert 11/05/2020 Mark Lambert 11/05/2020

Stranded

The source photograph for this series was taken is very close to the last- on the outskirts of Howarth.

The subject is intentionally mysterious, with only traces of it evident in the final prints.

Enfield Side 27 May 2018 11:24 Photo-etching and monoprint 2019

This mystery is hard-won, the result of much experimentation in both plate treatment and in forms of under-printing. I will return to the theme of experimentation in a later post.

There are two layers of under-printing in this series- both using burnt sienna as the base colour. Here you can see the subject dipping into the darker of the two.

Most of the ink used in this collection are ready-made tube inks. In this case, the main ink used is hand-prepared.

The plain etching below now makes the source clearer. What was left behind is a woollen glove, now ground into a shallow puddle by the side of the road. The puddle that the glove fell in is long-since dried out.

Though this is now evident, the plate was ground considerably to the bottom right (as viewing), making the wrist of the glove far less obvious. This is as it was on the day- hard to pick out from the stones stranded in this now dried up puddle.

Enfield Side 27 May 2018 11:24 Photo-etching 2019

Mark Lambert 04/05/2020 Mark Lambert 04/05/2020

Broken

This post breaks the recent chronological sequence. In the interests of posting promptly, I have opted for a further short sequence- but taken from a different walk at a different time of day, but still not far from those I have posted to date. This series is from an image taken on a summer’s day walk near Howarth, on road atop the Lower Laithe Dam.

It is of plastic fragments- the biggest part being of a broken sign that in normal times demonstrates the local water utility company’s interest. The company that manages the many reservoirs punctuating this landscape; reservoirs that I have taken great interest in photographing and painting over the years. Hence, the significance of this fragment, which is itself is part of a reservoir cartoon.

Lower Laithe Dam 28 May 2018 15:15 Photo-etching 2020

From the earliest printings of this plate, I was convinced that some further colour would add to the depth of the image. None of the earlier combinations seemed to add much- but latterly a little underprinting with pale ink gave a greater idea of the depth here. Here I used a circular mask to strengthen the pattern where the milk bottle top covers part of the sign.