Fiona Fouhy | Places of Inbetweenness

"I have been working quite organically in my print process, using faded ink ghosts of older prints in which to find new forms, some of which were interestingly quite like interiors of temperate rain forest, with moss-covered boulders.

I had also begun experimenting with using wetter, looser ink - that of Indian drawing ink - to start off my pieces and then gradually adding layers of monotypes on top of the drawings. The forms created by the Indian ink as it settles and dries are reminiscent of freckled lichen or mottled sea spray."

 "As an exercise in observing composition, I have recently made a few studies of Sally Mann’s photograph ‘Georgia, Untitled (Kudza)’ (1996), a semi abstract piece that continually fascinates me with its overabundant leaf coverage. In her semi autobiographical book ‘Hold Still’ she occasionally reveals her creative processes.

She writes that she finds herself praying ‘for the angel of uncertainty’ to visit her and ‘bestow upon (her work) essential peculiarities, persuasive consequence, intrigue, drama and allegory’. I certainly find myself with my fingers crossed as I run my plates through the press, hoping for happy accidents and unexpected collisions to have occurred in the process.

Mann’s landscapes to me are portals into the past or other presences - past presences in the landscape, allowing the slippages of light leaks or literal chemical missteps to produce otherworldly effects and imply other presences. Rather than describing a place visually with my print and drawing techniques, I am wanting to evoke the spirit of a place, the physical feeling of a place and the place as portal."

"On hearing Scottish national poet Kathleen Jamie read her new poem ‘The Green Room’ on Radio 3 in May (as part of a program on the Secrets of the Scottish Rainforest) I was entranced by the voice that she gives to Water in her piece. The Green Room acknowledges the central function of water (ie rain) within this rare environment, voicing its ancient cyclical journey from swamp, to ice, river, mist, droplet, pool, bog, within tree root, trunk, branch, leaf …. and out to ‘oak breath’. Her vivid visualisation of the moss and lichen makes you want to see and touch the drenched moss.

For a while I’ve felt that I want to embrace the wet weather that we often live with here on this island. One way that I’ve done that in the past ten years is through taking pleasure in our bi-annual fungi seasons, appreciating that the fruiting bodies of fungi appear only after it has rained. I also come from a family of gardeners and environmentalists who have instilled in me an affection for drizzle."