Sue Brown at Hope & Elvis

Sue Brown

Last year I went on a Gym Arabic Transfer workshop with Sue Brown at Hope & Elvis.  Sue Brown is a printmaker from Cheltenham (famous also for driving a 2CV - which you might catch a glimpse of later in some of the pics!)  She specialises in collagraph printing which involves making a collage of design elements as a print block which she can then print from.  And her work features lots of birds!  Here are some examples of Sue's work...

Examples of Sue's Work

Examples of Sue's Work

At this workshop Sue was sharing her expertise on the gum arabic transfer printing technique.  For this you need gum arabic, a wooden spoon, some laser printed images in black and white (very important) together with some papers and textiles to print on.  And some oil based printing inks.  Sue particularly likes Hawthorn inks!

Essential Tools - Gum Arabic & a Wooden Spoon

Laser copy of a photo

Lovely vintage papers to print onto

And of course, a cup of tea...

Reflecting on my first results with a cup of tea!

We printed onto lots of different papers and textiles and also did lots of mark making experiments with textured wallpaper, bubble wrap, white acrylic paint, magic foam which you can use to make your own printing blocks and different inks, wax and bleach.  See all the pics below...

That car again!

Prints drying (and a glimpse of Sue's 2CV)

My gum arabic transfers

My mark making

My booklets showing all techniques

Sue had showed us how to make some of our samples into simple booklets just by folding, cutting and gluing.  And here are some examples of everyone's booklets showing a combination of all the techniques we tried out...

Everyone's work

It was a great workshop - thanks, Sue!

Hope & Elvis, which is on the Welbeck Estate near Worksop, is a great place to go for a workshop.  There are great tutors, loads of materials to use, a friendly atmosphere (thanks to Louise Asher, who owns Hope & Elvis) and fabulous lunches provided by Magie Hollingworth (which are a highlight in themselves!) Check them out!