Making marks

Some years ago I came to an impasse. Having taken illustration commissions on and off for thirty years I stopped. Stopped dead in my tracks. Some personal projects remain unfinished, and I stopped promoting my work. I didn’t know why. It just happened.

A few weeks later I awoke in the middle of a dream. I could see a room that I had illustrated, and when I mean illustrated I mean everything in that room I had drawn on or designed and had printed, wallpaper furniture, fabrics. It was a room of wooden furnishings (a desk and some chairs) and musical instruments, all illustrated in many and varied monochrome patterns.

A few of days later I was chatting with a musician friend about creative inspiration, really about his inspiration as a singer-songwriter. Then he asked me about mine, and I told him about the room in the dream. There was a moment’s silence and I realised that I was going to do it, however long it took.

Fast forward a week and I spotted a saz in a charity shop for £5. It’s also known as a baglama, and is a stringed instrument like mandolin but with five strings. Somehow I knew it would be the first new canvas, and so it was. My style is quite complex and involves the use of patterns, vignettes, images drawn from the built and natural world and quotes. It’s been monochrome for the last decade. I like it that way. The illustrations are abstractions from things I’ve seen, developments of ideas from what I’ve seen and ideas I’ve created myself. Ideas may come from, for example, baroque coving, medieval tiles, costume motifs, leaf patterns, architecture or science. On the saz I used lissajous figures on the fretboard. These figures show relationships between frequencies, and can be used to describe different musical intervals.

Drawing on three-dimensional objects is a little more challenging than on sheets of paper or canvas. After some time and planning I was marking out the surface in pencil and then using black markers to ink the designs. The saz was soon finished with three layers of lacquer, and I went in search of another instrument.

The next was a ukulele that was in another charity shop for £3. It was perfect timing, as though the instrument wanted to be illuminated. This time I used masking tape to align for some of the patterns on the curves. I had found the saz was easier because each of the panels was relatively small on its bowl shaped back. The ukulele took more time than the saz, partly working on larger surface, and partly as I wanted to give the instrument something unique and not drawing on the same ideas as the saz.

The challenge of these smaller instruments is about getting everything you want on them. For larger pieces it’s about keeping it interesting rather than having one pattern over a large area. This only really struck me when I was working on the third instrument, a steel stringed classical guitar, probably home made as the frets are not all aligned. Re-doing the frets is for another day. I was so eager to get started, and I realised I was not so interested in playing it. I have a better made guitar for that!

With the guitar the areas are much bigger and to get lines across the curved back I chose to cut tape to place across it so that the pattern would be well laid out. For the sides I had in mind a balustrade design, and for that I cut out stencils with scissors, a move that I’ve repeated on the two other pieces I’ve worked on. Cutting the stencils or templates is not for the precision so much. It’s to get the layout balanced and to provide the basic shapes which I then ink by hand. Using a combination of tape and scissor cut templates certainly speeded up what would otherwise have been a relatively hit and miss project because of the curves.

Having completed these three pieces I realised how intriguing it is that to see the designs, in contrast to a framed image, you have to pick it up the piece to explore all the surfaces. On the instruments this is relatively easy to do, but not on what I took on next.

Having completed the three instruments I considered the room I could see in my head and it has a desk and chairs in it. I found a wooden ladder back chair someone was throwing on a skip and asked if I could take it. They were more than happy to let me – it left space for something else in the skip, and I said it would be put to good use. It did take a while because of the state of the chair. It was wobbly with cracked glue, and loose joints, so I had to take it apart and clean it up before illuminating it. Then it needed re-constructing, not a familiar skill but easy enough to learn when you’re motivated, as I am. With the chair there are surfaces no-one is ever likely to see, and that is part of the joy of it, the hidden secrets of this passion that has re-engaged me with illustration.

It was also intriguing working on the chair disassembled versus the complete instruments. The choices I made needed time to consider the relationship of patterns and motifs, and I remember also just focusing on one part not knowing quite how it would sit next to its neighbours. I’m really pleased with the outcome and will create some fabric for the seat soon enough.

At the moment I’m working on two pieces in spare moments. The first is a slow process of illuminating the inside of a tom drum. I decided that I’d only work on the inside and re-make the drum with a transparent skin, with a piece of glass on top of the skin so it can be used as a side table. I might even pop a light on the inside to make it easier to see the patterns. Once again I needed to deconstruct the piece, partly to clean up the fixings, partly just to be able to change the skin. I took off all the metallic outer cover so the outside will be plain lacquered wood. The inside will be constructed using stencils and templates so that I can readily mark the surface prior to inking in. That means getting the scissors and a craft knife out again, once I’ve finalised the design. What happens is that the bigger the project the more important it becomes to get the design clear. Once the ink pen’s in hand there’s no going back and that’s part of what I love about it.

A result of the revitalised passion is that the other piece I’ve started working on is back on card. It will be made into a relatively simple 3d object relevant to the story it tells. The moment that I decided to create it felt amazing – I was getting back on track with illustration but with new strings to my bow [and yes I’ve a violin and bow waiting in the wings], and new perspectives and inspiration. This piece also involves another aspect of my work the telling of stories, something I’m really pleased to get back to.

When I look at what I’ve created it really amazes me – the pieces come to life so differently, not just because they are on a 3d object but also because the object contextualises them. The journey has lead me to think more about the images I present and about their edges. That may sound a little strange, and yet, when you illuminate the outside of a guitar there are edges to consider, whereas a regular illustration on paper has just the edge of the sheet, perhaps extending over the frame if you wanted, although that is a relatively limited extension.

At the start of 2019 I visited the Bate Collection of Musical Instruments and the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford to look at their instruments, from beautiful early guitars and violins inlaid with ivory or ebony, to inlaid patterns on keyboards, and beautifully painted scenes on spinets and clavichords. I came away with even more enthusiasm, greater aspirations and plenty of inspiration. These old crafts helped me feel as though I’m part of a bigger movement too, a feeling that I was following in a great tradition. Enthused I even bid for an auctioned clavichord – suffice to say it’s sale price was way above my offer. But one day I’ll be ready and one will appear in a charity shop or on a skip!

As I chip away at the room in my mind, my friend, the musician, dropped in another suggestion using inlay instead of ink – certainly possible on furniture, and perhaps possible on sturdier instruments. One step at a time, especially as I’m enjoying this project so much! Maybe something for next year!