Illegible bits and pieces, letters and scraps

I made a piece this week called Back to the Old House. The title is borrowed from The Smiths.

It started with a paper doily. I taped it to a sheet of white card with little bits of masking tape and fed the whole thing through my printer.

The image I printed was one I’d been carrying around on my phone for a while. An ornate coffee cup with a last mouthful of black coffee sitting in the bottom, on a tablecloth in a London cafe.

Printed onto the doily, the image landed slightly off centre. When I peeled it away from the card, the composition was perfect.

I pasted it onto an 8 by 8 inch canvas with Mod Podge and hung it on the studio wall.

There’s something nostalgic about a doily and a coffee cup. The kind of things that live in your nan’s house. Which is probably where the title came from, without me overthinking it too much.

I’ve also been making collages in between other projects. I made one this week where I cut a sculpture out of a magazine and sat it on a black and white photograph of a chair. The two just fit. The sculpture looked like it had always been meant to sit there.

I transferred some Letraset over the top. Illegible bits and pieces, letters and scraps that don’t spell anything. I like type when it stops being language and just becomes shape.

Which brings me to a book I found this week.

I was in a bookshop and picked up Mid-Century Modern Graphic Design by Theo Inglis. It’s a big visual survey of the era: record sleeves, film posters, book covers, all those eye-popping palettes and bits of experimental imagery. Saul Bass and Blue Note records are featured, which is always a good sign.

Cheers,

Joe

Shop prints, clothing and more.