BICROMATE PRINTS. The photographic medium known as 'Gum bichromate' is an antique method of photographic printing which uses a sensitising chemical (Potassium dichromate/bichromate) to harden Gum Arabic, which in turn binds any pigment (either pure pigment or artist quality water colours) in the mixture onto the surface thus producing an image. The Gum Bichromate print is different from other processes in that the sensitive emulsion offers a base that a dye or water pigment can be added to produce any colour print the maker requires. It is also a process that allows re-coating the paper support several times using a different colour emulsion for each coat. An early photographic process, gum bichromate first emerged in the 1850s. Today, Peter Olley continues to evolve a process that offers a print-making language of unparalleled versatility and richness. The creation of a gum print involves the selection of an appropriate support, the preparation of the emulsion, and decisions regarding the use of colour and physical manipulation (or its absence). The broad syntax of gum printing - and its challenges - fuels a rich and rewarding print-making tradition.
Ken Hurd 2004
Peter Olley P Olley Artist Printmaker Artist/Printmaker Printmaking Cyanotype Gum Bichromate Gum Dichromate Screenprints Etchings Olympic Prints Olympic Games prints Soccer World Cup Prints Cyanotype, a process in which potassium ferriccyanide and ferric ammonium citrate are used to coat and sensitise an absorbent material. After drying, this is used as a photographic surface by contact with a negative and exposure to ultraviolet light. The resulting soft, characteristic deep blue image develops within the new surface rather than on a coated paper as in conventional photography. The photographic medium known as ³Gum bichromate² prints. It is an antique method of photographic printing which uses a sensitising chemical (Potassium dichromate/bichromate) to harden Gum Arabic, which in turn binds any pigment (either pure pigment or artist quality water colours) in the mixture onto the surface thus producing an image. The Gum Bichromate print is different than the other processes in that the sensitive emulsion offers a base that a dye or water pigment can be added to produce any colour print the maker requires. It is also a process that allows re-coating the paper support several times using a different colour emulsion for each coat. An early photographic process, gum bichromate first emerged in the 1850s. Today, photographers who chose to work with gum bichromate continue to evolve a process that while photographic, offers a print-making language of unparalleled versatility and richness. Gum prints can range from large, full colour prints of photographic tonality; to images that seem more akin to painting. Ultimately the choice lies with the individual photographer, and their personal aesthetic. It is this broad scope that fuels the richness of gum bichromate print-making. The creation of a gum print involves the selection of an appropriate support, the preparation of the emulsion, and decisions regarding the use of colour and physical manipulation (or its absence). The broad syntax of gum printing - and its challenges - fuels a rich and rewarding print-making tradition. Peter Olley attended the Royal College of Art, London, Britain's premier art institution during the early 60's, graduating in 1965. This was a particularly creative period for British art, and the themes established in his work at that time have remained remarkably consistent throughout almost four decades of practice. These are, an interest in the photographic image often derived from the mass media, and, by dramatic contrast, in the nature of marks generated by the skilled hand. The ways in which such mark making can transform and personalise standard, ubiquitous images remains a central tenet of his work, and one is reminded of Marshall McLuhan's famous maxim "the Medium is the Message" when confronted by the resultant prints. The roots of this intensely personal approach run back through the history of western printmaking. Until the nineteenth century, traditional print technology and processes served the full range of societies need for reproduced imagery, via manually driven methods like woodcut or etching. The challenge to this totality occurred during the Industrial Revolution and was led by photographically generated methods, and in a major sense, such procedures soon completely superseded traditional skills in terms of the mass media. In the case of Fine Art Printmaking however, a new relationship was forged between the two apparently contradictory, methodologies to their mutual benefit. The influences that flow through the work of Peter Olley illustrate such a symbiosis between modern reprographic technology and age-old hand skilled mark making. The prints that go to make up this series rely on the use of a video camera to select, isolate, and manipulate a single, static image from a continuous Television broadcast of a live, global event. Plucking just one image from the thousands that contribute to the total illusion of movement is merely the first stage in a process that gradually transforms the universal nature of the original into, eventually, a new, highly personal signature version. The novel use of cyanotype* technology to transfer and fix the chosen aspects of the image to paper gives a particular graphic quality to its reproduction. Among other things it enables the reduction of a multi-tonal set of forms into a single, soft, but dramatic cyan image which is strongly reminiscent of wood block, soft ground etching or aquatint; a link that is heightened by his use of high quality hand made paper. The prints are hand finished by the application of a range of pigments derived from unexpected sources. Commercially produced paints designed for wood, metal, or plaster are used here for the aesthetic qualities they demonstrate when applied by hand to an absorbent surface and set against the more mechanical qualities of cyanotype. The resulting prints are rich, complex and dramatic, making reference to past and present, from hand colour tinted wood block prints and early photographs to the instant access to worldwide events through increasingly sophisticated satellite technology. The choice of events, which excite truly global interest like the Olympic games or currently the World Cup, demonstrates an involvement with the nature and function of the image as perceived through the means of mass communication. All art works are essentially one person's view of an aspect of the world, and Peter Olley's ability to transform and transcend the universal allows us to share in the journey that takes it from information to art. Professor Keith Cummings July 2002 * A process in which potassium ferriccyanide and ferric ammonium citrate are used to coat and sensitise an absorbent material. After drying, this is used as a photographic surface by contact with a negative and exposure to ultraviolet light. The resulting soft, characteristic deep blue image develops within the new surface rather than on a coated paper as in conventional photography. Those viewing my work may be interested to read my account of an incident reported on the news some twenty years ago, deeply affecting my work ever since. The incident involved a violent assault by one of the ceremonial guards, on a visiting dignitary making a state visit to a neighbouring country. The filmed event was replayed in slow motion, describing the scene again. The visitor moved past lines of identically dressed soldiers, motionless, and standing to attention. The hypnotic, jogging effect of the slow speed heightened the sense of drama as the narrative moved inexorably, frame by frame, to its violent finale. At "the climactic point of maximum tension", the suspense is broken as a slight eye movement betrayed the culprit as he sprung into action. The previously unavailable control of time, and choice of moment, offered by pause, fast forward, rewind, slow motion and freeze buttons to replay and edit recorded material from sporting events, has allowed me to recapture the pure thrill of "the moment of maximum tension" repeatedly, in the production of these cyanotype prints. I would also wish to acknowledge the sequential, narrative prints of Max Klinger 1857-1920, the Austrian symbolist, particularly his series of etchings "Adventures of a glove" published 1881-98, where he develops narrative structures within given time frames. An early example of this influence may be detected in "Family Circle -The Accident," one of a series of sequential screenprints I produced in 1985, where a collage of multi-sourced photographs create a sense of impending drama, as I look through a window.
