I am a printmaker based in West Yorkshire.
I work from a studio in an old mill building in Halifax.    

I make hand pulled prints mainly using intaglio processes such as etching, drypoint and carborundum, and occasionally collograph.  These methods use the pressure of a roller to press damp paper into the inked surface of a plate where it is held by the marks and textures which have been created on its smooth surface.

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Initially, I worked mainly with etching, I was drawn to the way that print binds together conceptual opposites. It seemed like magic that it is what has been removed from the plate is made visible by the printing process . As I started to work with other forms of printmaking it was the way that each process enabled me to make marks which I could not achieve any other way that drew me in. While I always feel that my main relationship is with the plate that I make, lifting up the blankets to see a new print for the first time is a special moment.

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Printmaking is a slow way of making work. First I work on a plate and become familiar with how it looks, and then I make the print which is its mirror image, and in this way I see it anew. Because intaglio prints are made on damp paper, once the plate has been printed the paper must be dried flat between blotters. This stage of the process adds a temporal distance as I don’t see the prints again until they are fully dry.  If I’m lucky it’s at this stage when I learn something new about the subject which I am exploring.

​​It is important to me that printmaking allows me to tie together idea and process through the material which is being manipulated, and which can itself influence the work which is made.  The plate I make is the result of both deliberate action and chance as I aim to influence what happens, but not to control it fully.I love the way this enables a unity and coherence with the concept being explored, and for me, this adds an additional level of meaning to the work. 

I make only small editions of prints, working primarily in series as I develop my thoughts through the process of making.  I am less interested in being able to make multiple identical images which is so often seen as a key element of printmaking's process, but rather the link between the processes I have used and the concept behind the work.