Helen Hanson - Landscape in Ink and Coloured Pencil

First published in 2022 by

The Crowood Press Ltd

Ramsbury, Marlborough

Wiltshire SN8 2HR

www.crowood.com

Helen Hanson 2022

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British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

ISBN 978 0 7198 4067 8

Cover design: Sergey Tsvetkov

Dedication

For my sister, Sylvia, with grateful thanks

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank the team at The Crowood Press for inviting me to write about this unusual mix of media, and for their support throughout the project. I am indebted to the Society of Botanical Artists, who made a place for me as a printmaker and then as a coloured pencil artist and brought me many friends. My grateful thanks are also due to all the artists and colleagues who taught and encouraged me on my artistic journey, including Felicity House who introduced me to the delights of ink, and Roger Reynolds who supervised my first tentative steps in coloured pencil. My special thanks go to my sister, to whom this book is dedicated, for her unfailing support since my earliest printmaking days, and whose most recent kindness was the early proofreading of this book.

Introduction

I n writing this book I became aware that the steps I had taken to arrive at my current method of working had led me full circle, reconnecting me firmly with my early interests. There is something pleasing about this circularity, and I hope that my personal journey and this book will encourage you to follow what you enjoy, to be creative and maybe break new ground.

My enthusiasm for art goes back to early childhood. Thanks to an excellent natural history teacher, I also developed an interest in the flora of Britain. Grass of Parnassus, Bee Orchid and Ploughmans Spikenard were just some of the poetic names that lodged in my memory from our class trips to the local Ainsdale dunes to identify its noted wildflowers.

I became a Modern Languages teacher, but retained an interest in both art and wild plants. In my mid-twenties I enrolled for a printmaking evening class, turning up hopefully with a dried artichoke head, and produced my first linocut. I became fascinated with the process of printmaking, joined an etching class the following year, and was soon hooked. It quickly became clear what inspired me as I turned my attention to landscape, incorporating many of the plants I knew would give a sense of place. I started working seriously in my spare time and gradually built up a portfolio.

In the 1980s I joined Greenwich Printmakers, an artists co-operative gallery. Membership changed everything for me and set me on a path of exhibiting, selling my work in galleries throughout the UK, and an increasingly busy life as a printmaker.

REINVENTING MYSELF

After about thirty years of printmaking, I sold my press and decided to embark on a self-education project. I began a rollercoaster few years of attending courses in any art medium that appealed. I am grateful to all my tutors, as I show in my acknowledgements. I tried and tested everything. One day I introduced coloured pencil into one of my landscape etchings, then tried a smaller version of the same image using ink and coloured pencil, the two media I had found most appealing.

I began a series and a whole new lease of life creatively. I had managed to reinvent myself, and a bonus followed in the form of new teaching opportunities. I was presenting an unusual mix of media, both easy to learn and apply, and felt enthusiastic and motivated. It allowed me to teach both local and residential courses and to work with consenting adults a real joy!

WHAT TO EXPECT

The combination of ink and dry coloured pencil is unexpected. Most internet searches produce examples of pen and wash or pen and watercolour pencil. These are usually created in the traditional way, by tinting an ink drawing, either before or after depicting the scene. My approach is not one of colouring in, although I use it very sparingly for emphasis; instead, I integrate the two media as I work, using them to translate the landscape. I include techniques such as embossing and lifting out colour, interpreting the landscape through the methods at my disposal. It is a thoughtful, slow-growing process that feels like putting together a mildly challenging jigsaw.

Sky, Sea and Sand was an etching of Machrihanish Bay, Kintyre. At the end of a walk along the shore, the clouds broke into a dramatic diagonal formation. With the foreground dunes and machair, the breakers and the Paps of Jura, I had my image. The edition of 150 was printed using one plate and ten colours, with additional hand-colouring.

Breaking Waves. This small etching was a companion to Sky, Sea and Sand, depicting the same stretch of Kintyre shoreline. It was also on one plate, inked in several colours, and the foreground flowers were added in watercolour.

Kintyre. I often etched one or two miniatures to go with a larger series. This one was also of Kintyre and the same stretch of machair, using the same palette but with fewer colours.

First Light. The last of a series of three etchings, which prompted my change to ink and coloured pencil. I editioned the plate in a deep indigo, using Faber-Castell pencils to add drifts of colour to the print when dry. I liked the combination so much that new ideas started flowing fast and have not stopped.

Spring Dawn. This was my first work in ink and coloured pencil, based on the previous etching. I chose a smaller, square format, using the branches and foreground as a frame to enclose the bird. It is predominantly ink, but the blended coloured pencil was ideal for the dawn sky.