This canal view is one of a pair as well as part of the 100 views series. The other print being ‘Gas Street Basin’. Initially I wanted the bollard in the foreground to be a pivot between the two prints and I still feel that is an interesting concept for future diptychs in the series. I could not get the Gas Street Basin (GSB) print to work from that angle though and so in the end I had to be satisfied with creating the two prints at the same time, using a very similar palette and depicting milky grey weather conditions. There are a couple of other pairings in the series: Ironman and Overtime is paired with Presiding Over and I’m presently working on two prints of the Typhoo Tea Building, but I’m not sure if they relate to each other in any way other than the building depicted. In the future I would love to do table tennis players in the centre of the library as a print at the bottom with a print above depicting the library building and a small sphere (the table tennis ball) – a diptych to be viewed vertically.
Mailbox³ was terrifically complicated to carve and to print, as indeed was GSB. I was adjusting my plans after each layer and this became incredibly time consuming. More is not always better though and I have moved towards clearer and more succinct use of layers subsequently.
What I liked about making these prints though is that Mailbox³ is viewed from a little island and you have to go down the steps that are in the curved brick structure in GSB to get there. So at the time and when you are there one place leads onto the next.
Incidentally, alt 0179, creates the cubed symbol. Thank you internet search engine.