Half Cut Exhibition | Curated by Nick Morley

posted by Marcroy February 17, 2014

Half Cut is an exhibition of linocut and woodcut prints curated by Nick Morley running from March 7th-31st 2014 (Private View March 6th) Stour Space Gallery, London. Bringing together artists from the UK, USA and Italy, Half Cut is a showcase of contemporary woodcut and linocut prints. The apparently simple technique of carving and printing a block of wood or linoleum gives rise to a multitude of possibilities.

The artists in the exhibition have been selected for their innovative and diverse approaches to the medium. Each artist’s hand is apparent in the printed images they produce; concept and method are intertwined.

Featuring: Victoria Browne, Umberto Giovannini, Nick Morley, Heidi Plant, Peter Rapp, Sean Starwars, Euan G. Stewart, Mark Andrew Webber.

Victoria Browne and Mark Andrew Webber apply strict rules to the way they carve lino. Victoria Browne uses just one Japanese carving tool and one block to make the prints in her Training Nature series. She uses the reduction technique, invented by Picasso, to building up layers of repetitive marks in different colours to give the illusion of 3D topiary forms. Mark Andrew Webber’s work Form I is the first in a series of boxed sets. Com- prising 6 prints and an accompanying essay it explores ideas of simplicity/complexity. Starting with a single line or simple geometric shape, lines are added one at a time, following a rule which dictates their direction and length. The resulting patterns bend the mind and trick the eye, often appearing to move in space.

Sean Starwars and Umberto Giovannini both make woodcuts but their approaches couldn’t be more different. Sean Starwars carves with furious speed, fueled by a constant supply of Mountain Dew. His prints are populated by cartoon characters from popular culture as well as alcoholic clowns and smoking dogs. Their eye-popping colours suggest a world of hedonism and excess. Umberto Giovannini’s series explores the landscape of London through the distorting fish-eye lens of his iphone camera. The digital becomes the analogue as the information is transferred to woodcut and the forms and colours become abstracted and simplified. The natural grain of the wood adds further visual noise, degrading the image in the same manner as a vhs recorder.

Peter Rapp and Euan G. Stewart present black and white series. Peter Rapp’s images of beasts and monsters from mythology are based on Jorge Luis Borges’ Book of Imaginary Beings. Going far beyond mere illustration, each scenario is richly imagined and rendered in exsquisite detail. Euan G. Stewart’s series Identity Crisis superimposes screaming faces with fingerprint patterns, creating a disturbing and arresting double portrait. These composite blocks of black and white seem to imprint themselves directly onto the retina.

Heidi Plant and Nick Morley both work at Resort Studios in Margate. Heidi Plant only started making linocuts last year. Her skillful yet uninhibited, almost childlike, approach to carving lino results in images of great lightness and freedom. Her compositions suggest a narrative beyond what you see, as if part of some other, fantasy world, where play and adventure replace real life. Nick Morley’s linocuts borrow from the illustration traditions of the past, from Thomas Bewick to The Beano. His subject matter explores Man’s relationship with Nature, as well as what makes us uniquely human. Often he imposes human attributes onto animals in a seemingly humorous way. At the same time he hints at the futility of our existence.