RESURGENCE

This image was printed on Peter Abbs poetry page in the magazine Resurgence this month; it is part of a series I began 3 or 4 years ago now, images for 'Perceval', a companion volume to my first Artists Book 'Gawain' finished in 1997. These images are twice the size - it would be lovely to do a large book this size ( about 32" X 22" ) but slightly impractical - I just got very excited cutting away at ideas on 4'X2' sheets of plywood.
This image is of Perceval in the forest with the swan he has just shot in his ignorance; the blood drops onto a nest of vipers.

These are two bad girls in the forest, a reference to Wagners flower maidens in the second act of his opera.

Here are some woodpeckers in faintly sinister consultation.

And here is a Grail-bearing Maiden, together with a knight-setting-out taken from a famous illuminated MSS.

I think I finished about 7 images in all and exhibited them alongside other woodcuts in the Star Gallery; then got side tracked by other books and the realisation that I was getting severely allergic to the formaldehyde in the glue in the plywood ( I am now trying some new friendly Japanese plywood but it is not nearly as nice as my rough old stuff...and doesn't come in hugely big sheets...).

I hope to get back to re-forging all this into a Book next year - a big project, may take a little time! but I am looking forward to it.

At present..... back to something to celebrate Blake's 250th, and the Falcon Bride.