Meet the Maker: 2025 Round Up!
At the end of each Meet the Maker post, we ask our makers to share their advice and words of encouragement for fellow creatives. Read through our 2025 round-up and gather some inspiration for the new year ahead!
Embrace how long the linocutting process is. I personally enjoy working on a large lino block for many hours or even days. It forces me to slow down from the hectic day to day life. It's almost a form of meditation for me, and it allows me to clear my head by just focusing on 1 thing. Instead of looking at carving as something that takes a long time and requires patience, I like to look at it as a chance to have some quality alone time.
Exhibit when you can, get to know other printmakers and make sure that you have a supportive community of other artists around you. It helps when you're in your studio by yourself to know that you have a network of other people that you can ask for help when you're feeling stuck or bounce questions off.
Ask yourself why you’re doing it. Be professional, not only with people you work with but, importantly, yourself. This is your career, and it's essential that you take it seriously.
Look at your competition and try to understand why they are good, and what they do that is better than you. Strive to improve and constantly progress technically and conceptually.
Do your homework, understand the financial side of it all and be professional with the people you work with. Then make as much money as you can to continue funding your practice.
Hmm one always has to be careful about offering advice. Implies the offeree knows more than the person to whom the advice is offered. But here goes with a few pointers:
Try sh*t out. Play around and have fun. Be brave and print/paint/draw as if no one else is going to see it, ever. It doesn’t matter if other people love it or hate it, how do YOU feel about it. And never, ever, feel slighted if some anonymous selection committee rejects your work for some show or other. It really, really, is all completely subjective.
Botanical cyanotypes are a great starting point when learning the process. Masterful prints can materialise from the study and contemplation of the natural world. It is an outstanding visual reference to work from. Always observe your surroundings with a curious eye. I love to immerse myself in a beautiful landscape, such as a wonderfully scented forest or a lakeside walk. On a sunny day, I notice how sunlight casts shadows through leaves and trees on the ground, and when I travel, I will photograph the colours and textures of trees and plants and write notes about anything that catches my eye.
Do the thing you’ve been wanting to try! As a creative you’re told to ‘stick to what you know’, but if I’d have done that I’d still be trying to convince myself to continue with my mediocre watercolour paintings. Being seen as a jack of all trades isn’t a bad thing, especially if it leads to you finding your passion as I did with printmaking.
Art is a devotional act. Your purpose is to produce the best work you can and leave others to judge. Feel stuck? Look within, you have the answer, you are just looking at the wrong place.
Take your time, make things you want to see in the world, and just keep going.
Show up every day and do something that progresses your creative practice forward. Even if it’s just one task, or only 20 minutes that you can spare, do it every day, build a habit, and those small steps you take will start to feel like a sprint!
Also, if you have access to printmaking facilities, either at your school, university or local area - please use them! It’s the best way to meet other creatives, bounce ideas around, get some feedback and find the support you need as a creative.
Experiment and persevere! Experimenting with the process is the best way to understand not only yourself as an artist, but the technique you are looking to dive into. I think with social media these days, its easy to quickly find out what materials are best to use, but just because you are buying the same art materials doesn’t mean the art will turn out the same quality. Experimenting with different types of paper, inks and even barens is all key to figuring out your own artistic voice. I had to go through so much trial and error to find the materials that suited me best and it’s so important to keep playing around until you find this. Perseverance is key with linocut. Trying a new craft can be so daunting, but the more you do it the better you get at it. Although linocut at times can be so challenging, just trust the process and keep going!
Keep a forgiving eye on how your creativity fluctuates through time. I really beat myself up over not being more explorative or making enough new work, but noticing the small ways that in that period of time your heart or head get switched on and use that as fuel. Even if it's expressing something in a really small way that's for nothing else but really being with that moment, just do it. Also for printmaking in particular, never throw any misprints away (someone will always want them), keep a journal of your plate progress and editioning notes (I never do but wish I had) and always have nail polish in the studio (in case you got ink or general print goo staining your hands and you get invited on a date).
I’m not sure I’m in any sort of position to dispense advice about anything. However, some things that I’ve found helpful have been:
Making sure I pay attention to the boring things like composition, perspective and drawing – I’ve seen a lot of prints spoiled by poor composition/design - a strong image is important.
I also try to not get to obsessed by the craft of printmaking and keep reminding myself that I’m making a piece of art. I’ve seen a lot of amazing, technically brilliant prints that ultimately are not very interesting to look at.
I had to spend years finding my own style, but I believe that I have now developed a visual language that makes my work different from other artists. This was not a contrived thing and cannot be forced, you’ll just have to trust it will arrive in time.
One last piece of non-advice: make work for yourself and not for any other reason. It will show if you don’t!
Trust yourself over anyone else whilst staying open to interpretation. Make a bunch of mistakes. Allow yourself rest. Turn off your phone.
Keep a sketchbook! I have finally found out myself quite recently why this is so important, and this is even after telling all my students to do it all the time but not actually doing it myself.
Have faith in yourself and keep practising. Be kind to yourself and don’t worry too much when something doesn’t work; pick yourself up and try again. Remember that social media mostly shows the successes and not the prints that end up in the bin. And if you love print, just keep learning and printing and see where it takes you.
Learn how to do something and then do it differently.
There is no wrong way. You don’t need to follow the rules, or the crowd. Keep experimenting. Keep doing what you do. Don’t compare yourself to anyone else, comparison is the thief of joy. The second you stop experimenting and playing and pushing the boundaries, you lose yourself and your individuality.
In the words of Sister Corita Kent ‘The only rule is WORK’. ‘If you work it will lead to something’, keep trying, keep showing up, if it doesn't work try again or try a different way. I feel like I learn every day and that's one of the most satisfying things about working in the arts.
Also, lean into the community. There are so many great community print studios out there where printmakers can learn from each other and build friendships. This applies to the suppliers too. I love the way that print supplies come from small businesses or family run businesses where we know who we're dealing with and who are always happy to help. Really, the printmaking world is a pretty great place to be.
I think my main piece of advice is not to overthink things, care less about what other people think and just keep making/drawing for yourself. You will find the strands that link everything that you do and find your own unique style that brings you joy. I spent a long time thinking my work wasn’t good enough because it didn’t have an overt political ‘message’ or deep philosophical meaning, but I now realise that making colourful prints in the way that I do, often of things that may seem quite quotidian, appeals to people quite deeply, and brings a lot of joy and that’s just as valid.
I’m not sure I’m qualified to give advice to printmakers as I’ve still so much to learn, but these would be my top tips:
• Don’t let not having a studio or all the top equipment prevent you from printing, work with what you have (2020 showed us that this is possible), experiment, play and see what happens.
• Keep going, even when it feels like a disaster and you hate what you’ve created. Keep on keeping on.
• Find other printmakers in real life or online and ask for help
Just keep at it, and don’t expect every day to be the same. One week I’m incredibly productive and the following week is a different story. Accept and embrace the creative flow.
I also recommend keeping a logbook. I take notes of all my "inky experiments" in a notebook; they are incredibly useful to refer back to when printing more of an edition, and to document my learning.
Do what you enjoy. Always keep your tools sharp... and always cut away from yourself.
Apply for competitions and exhibitions even if you’re not ready or it’s a long way off. The deadline will motivate you to get pieces finished whatever the outcome. Also try not to take rejection from exhibitions personally - not easy I know. I got a print selected for the RA summer exhibition only once years ago but I try again every few years. I haven’t got back in yet but I know the pressure of the deadline will make me create something new which I then have ready to apply for other opportunities.
Being very new to printmaking I am not sure if I am best placed to give advice, but I hope people might be inspired by my journey into printmaking. So, from that perspective I would say don’t be afraid to leave your comfort zone and explore new creative endeavours. Try new ways of working and explore different mediums. It may take you in a completely different direction!
Something a friend taught me a while ago was not to dismiss my work instantly if it doesn’t turn out how I’d planned it in my head. Printmaking can be so unpredictable, and learning to embrace that has been so helpful for me. I’ve started putting finished prints away for a few days, then getting them out to look at with fresh, objective eyes and some of my favourite prints I’ve made would’ve ended up in the bin if I hadn’t!
Just follow your heart and do what gives you joy, and it will surely bring joy to others. Try not to be hard on yourself if you don’t have instant success. Finding a style that expresses who you are and how you experience the world around you takes time!