Bookworks – Gandha Key

I make mainly concertina bookworks as I like to work in image series and you can open out a concertina bookwork to display all the images.

Where I Was Born is a bookwork in concertina form, it comprises drypoints and chine colle, printed on Somerset 285gsm paper with Akua inks at Shadwell Print Studio in London.

It includes images of the north of England where I was born, went to school and where all my family come from. I have very strong memories from the particular school in Huddersfield, with its huge fireplace and gloomy low-lit classroom; the geography of the region, the industrial elements, the ‘dark satanic mills’, but one must not forget the amazingly beautiful countryside, where I have taken many walks in sun and blizzard over the years.

Fourteen Cafes in Holloway: This concertina bookwork is my homage to the chapbooks of Ed Ruscha who worked with a series of images in his bookwork One Way Street and Fourteen Gasoline Stations. My bookwork incorporates fourteen cafes that existed in Holloway Road, north London in the 90s, near where I live. Digital prints from photos taken early mornings along the length of Holloway Road, to avoid any parked cars. Hahnemulle paper.

Dawn in Cheyenne: Waiting for the Diner to Open. This bookwork incorporates a series lino prints and monoprints of cups of tea and tells stories of places around the world; from San Francisco to India, where I had a cup of tea. With Japanese stab binding and images printed on Lotkha paper. It’s very interesting to reflect on the various places where I sat for a few moments drinking whatever kind of tea was available in that region: golden, sweet Turkish tea in a glass to milky, spicy tea in Poona, India.

No Time for Tears: Time for Tea: concertina bookwork using a variety of methods: perspex and tetrapak drypoint, collograph.

Some Local Colour : a famous photographer once said that if you want to photograph colour you have to go where the colour is: the Caribbean, the South Pacific… As I couldn’t afford such a venture I decided to find as many colours in my local area – from yellows and oranges to reds, blues and greens. The bookwork is published on blurb.com

Seven Doorways and a Broken Bottle: A homage to Ed Ruscha once again, to his book Fourteen Swimming Pools and a Broken Glass. This bookwork incorporates doorways found around the Archway, north London area and is digitally printed on Somerset paper

Our Day at the Estuary: Concertina bookwork incorporating water colour sketches made on the beach at Chalkwell on the Thames Estuary on a sunny May day.