Exposure

Sometimes I despair: I have been printing now for five years give or take. Five years of cleaning down my rollers, palette knives and the sheets of glass for mixing inks. Five years of sloshing white spirit from five litre cartons and mopping it up with paper. Yesterday it finally occurred to me to put some of the white spirit in a spray bottle and, taa daa, cleaning up became a miracle of economy, accuracy and efficiency.

The print I mentioned last time has reached the stage where all the action is down at the bottom of the image. I’m on oil based lino now so using the press. It’s important to have a fair amount of pressure so I packed the press with additional paper and was heaving the handle across with my feet braced on its feet (imagine Mammy lacing Scarlett into her corset Gone With The Wind style). The print quality was still very patchy. In desperation I went to get my husband (now he works from home he is open to such abuses) to give it some more welly. Instead he considered the print for a moment, fished a small scrap of lino from the bin and positioned it at the top end of the block. Instant printing success: his small adjustment stopped the block from rocking away from the plate. His brains triumphing over my brawn.

It could be that the cold has addled my brain. My dad, supplier of the dehumidifier, also supplied the genes for a total inability to generate my own warmth. I get up, think of a sensible number of clothes to wear, double it and still I cool through the day like a human storage heater, needing to be reheated in the bath by evening. It’s tiring and it’s not great for my image. Van Gogh had the romance of candles stuck to his hat while he painted the wheeling stars in the French night sky. Turner, I bet, looked heroic in a sou'wester while lashed to the mast and sketching his storms at sea. I, on the other hand, resemble the sensible pensioner in the Government information films about winter cold; the one who’s wearing those oh so practical layers, fleecy slippers and a warm knee blanket. I too have the warming mug of tea and the hot water bottle. I’m even wearing the cat...