Ruth Siddals

In May, I went up to Sewingshields Crags. I found my expedition very challenging, because it was arduous, remote and lonely. In wild Northumberland, stones and lichens count for more than a solitary person. And the same would have been true 1900 years ago. So my image tries to capture something of all that experience. I became interested in monoprinting when I first saw work by other members of Northern Print.

The process was new to me, so this project about Hadrian’s Wall enabled me to experiment, and find my own way of doing monoprints. I used oil paint and linseed oil, rather than printer’s ink, because for the colours I needed, those were the materials I had to hand. And I used Fabriano Rosaspina paper. For the initial printing plates, I used recycled packaging in the form of rigid and soft plastic; and I added paint to the plates with a palette knife, pounce, brush or sponge.

I also used masks when creating the sky and land, printing partly by hand and partly with a small press. Then, I ‘built’ the wall, one stone at a time, with individual plates cut from dense foam. Finally, I discovered that crumpled tissue paper worked best to create the lichens.