Resonating the Visual: Printmaking and Sound Practice

Abstract

In this paper, I would like to reflect on the relationship between printmaking and sound practice. I am interested in how one method of creative technological practice informs and translates to others, for example how working with printmaking can influence the way artists approach sound or music and vice versa how working with sound, deep listening can change the way we create and read the visual image. The elements of printmaking techniques such as layering, transparency, and viscosity can easily be recognised in the creation of sound compositions but equally the rhythm, passage of time, performance can also be read in the examples of printmaking when moving image qualities flow back and feed into the works on paper. In particular, I am interested in how the visualisation of sound can affect the image making and how the ephemeral qualities of sound and memories translate into printmaking forms.
In my presentation, I will refer to examples from my practice, which connect printmaking, visual elements with sound in the context of a recent group exhibition Sounds Like Her in New Art Exchange, Nottingham (Ain Bailey, Sonia Boyce MBE RA, Linda O'Keeffe, Elsa M'bala, Madeleine Mbida, Magda Stawarska-Beavan and Christine Sun Kim). Collectively the selected works represent sound in the broadest sense, exploring voice, noise, organic and synthetic sounds, rhythmic patterns, sonic structures and non-sonic materialisations of sound. The result is a varied exhibition of mixed media bringing together audio, immersive installation, painting, print, drawing, video, as well as interactive practice. Alongside those examples I will also consider some details from my installation work “Krakow to Venice in 12 Hours”