A multiple practice
Doubtful Spring lithograph 79x72cm
Art in Healthcare Collection
She exudes vitality and it comes as no surprise to learn that
she studied the joint MA (Hons) in History of Art and Drawing and Painting at
the University of Edinburgh. She reckons that her multi-tasking approach to
work is due to this early dual training.
Printmaking was an option Tyson took in her final undergraduate
years and she found that the department’s nurturing ambience suited her better
than Drawing and Painting. Soon after graduating she joined the Printmakers
Workshop, later to become Edinburgh Printmakers where she found the same
support she had enjoyed at art college. Typically she soon gave back as much as she
had received by serving as chairperson on their committee at a pivotal time of
change in the 1980s.
Big Sky By Lismore screenprint and lithograph 90x119cm
Art in Healthcare Collection
She is clearly passionate about printmaking and while
lithography is her main practice, she uses a whole variety of techniques from
traditional to digital technology. This is no mean feat as they all work on
different principles. She loves the lithographic process and finds the grinding
and preparation of the stone relaxing and conducive to the planning of her
composition. Printmaking is all about deconstructing the image and rebuilding it
layer by layer, like a slow form of painting, she explains, and because colours
are applied sequentially, you have to adapt each one according to the others.
Rackwick screenprint and lithograph 56x68cm
Art in Healthcare Collection
She frequently mixes elements from these different techniques
to capture even the most subtle effect, screenprinting for opacity, manière noire for a touch of drama, soap
washes for paler appeal and hand-drawn marks for direct impact. Her range of
skills and her ability to adapt and switch between methods have proved to be
most useful to her at times when working away in less well equipped studios.
This versatility imparts freshness and immediacy to her works
while her calculated economy of details draws you into her compositions. You
feel included in the landscape rather than an onlooker.
The End Of The Road - Craignish lithograph and screenprint 38x57cm
image courtesy of the artist
Her predilection for marginal places has taken her to St
Kilda, the Lofoten Islands and the Namib desert among others, all names synonymous
with harsh and precarious living. Humans’ aptitude to survive in those
inclement conditions is often acknowledged in her vast landscapes by some small
and somewhat futile signs of their presence like a telephone box or a tattered
poster. She dedicated her exhibition ‘Shelter’ at the Open Eye Gallery in
Edinburgh in 2013 to this topic.
Out To The Atlantic screenprint 63x85cm
Art in Healthcare Collection
Gill Tyson is currently organising an exhibition of fine prints
created by the Edinburgh printing firm Harley Brothers whose master printers
collaborated with the great names of Scottish art during the 1950s and 60s
before going into decline. Their lithographs of works by Anne Redpath and
Elizabeth Blackadder and many more will be brought together for the first time
in Gallery Ten in Edinburgh, a space Tyson co-founded in 2012.
Strange Place, Believe Me lithograph and screenprint 83x90cm
image courtesy of the artist
She is delighted to have been selected as the 2014 Printmaker
of the Year by ‘Printfest’, an event based in Ulverston in Cumbria across the
bay where she was born. She will be making new work during her residency and will
help generate interest into her art, a role she is looking forward to with
characteristic enthusiasm.
Martine Foltier Pugh is a visual artist and freelance writer based in Edinburgh
With thanks to Gill Tyson
Links to further information
