Eyestorm Blog

This week sees our two sister sites, ES Illustration and Artica, merge into one and come together at Artica.com. Angie Davey tells more.

It was a love of drawing and the limited availability of illustration as collectable prints that inspired the set-up of ES Illustration as a sister website to Eyestorm in early 2010. Showcasing the work of just 18 artists, it focussed on and celebrated drawing as a medium, in all it compulsiveness, showing the artists’ imaginations stretched to their limits through perfectly executed works, from quirky doodles such as Birds by Alyson Fox to more established graphite pieces such as The Offering by Nick Sheehy.

Birds by Alyson Fox

The Offering by Nick Sheehy

Since Eyestorm’s recent connection with Artica, however - an online gallery for young emerging art - we’ve decided to merge the ES Illustration and Artica into one in order to provide a platform for buying less complex limited editions in higher edition sizes which are therefore more affordable. By doing this we hope Artica will act as a stepping stone for new collectors who perhaps are a little wary of buying their first piece of art.

If you are a subscriber to the Artica newsletter I’ll be introducing the artists one by one over the coming weeks, but for now here’s a little taster of what’s to come. Prices start from around £50 incl. VAT for a signed, limited edition print.

Browse Artica here and join the Artica mailing list.

Angie Davey
Creative Director

    
Home Sweet Home by Solitaire and Tawny Park by Graham Carter

We’re excited to have available two of the fantastic ‘Painting By Numbers’ piece from 2001, one in each colour. Angie Davey tells us more.

    
Painting By Numbers inRed and Blue

If you’ve been down to Grand Designs Live this week, you will have seen our centrepiece - the fantastic Painting By Numbers by the one and only Damien Hirst.

Encased in a bespoke Perspex box by John Jones framers especially for the fair, it currently looks the best it’s ever looked since it’s creation in 2001 and stands its ground as a statement limited edition by the artist, who of course currently has a groundbreaking retrospective on at Tate Modern.

Meant as a humorous take on the ‘spot’ paintings that have become icons of our time, Painting By Numbers is made up of branded box packaging (in either red or blue), ninety brushes, ninety enamel paints each bearing a different number and a blank canvas with the outlines of ninety circular dots placed in neat rows, each with a number that corresponds to a number on the paint pots. The idea, of course, is that each dot is painted with a different colour paint, much like the paint by numbers books we used to have as children, and the result: an original Damien Hirst spot painting, which currently sell for between £650,000 and £1.2m each. Hirst will not have painted it himself obviously, but he doesn’t paint his paintings himself either – he is of course known for his use of assistants - so this piece is not only a play on the popular children’s colouring books, but an investigation about the authenticity of painting itself, especially the paintings he passes as his own, which has caused much controversy over the years.

Painting By Numbers being framed at John Jones framers in bespoke Perspex box frame

If you’re a fan of the ‘spot’ pieces, Painting By Numbers is almost created for you; quirky, fun and something very original and a little bit different.

We currently have two Painting By Numbers pieces available, one in each colour, each in an edition of 175 and signed by the artist. See more here.

If you have a Painting By Numbers, or any of the Eyestorm published editions such as Valium, Lysergic Acid Dethylamide (LSD), Opium and Beautiful Galactic Exploding Screenprint (Spin) that you would be interested in selling or if you’re looking to buy any of these pieces, please do get in touch and we’ll see what we can do.

Angie Davey
Creative Director

Today sees the launch of the much anticipated new limited edition screenprint by Henrik Simonsen, 'Red With Dragonflies'. Pairing perfectly with previous prints 'Blue and Orange' and 'Yellow and Blue', the new piece is currently on show at Grand Designs Live.

Red With Dragonflies by Henrik Siomonsen

Working with artists while making new publications is one of the best parts of my job; not only do I get to go and hang out with them at their studio and in the print room, the nostalgic smell of paint transporting me back to my art college days, but I also have a chance to be around and give input when the work is being created and for me this is what it's all about.

After the success of Henrik's last print 'Blue and Orange', published by Eyestorm last year, we wanted to create a new edition that was in keeping with the format of previous print editions, but that had evolved with Henrik's working practice. Between October 2011 and mid-April this year, Henrik was in his studio more or less 7 days a week, 12 hours a day, working towards a solo show of his paintings which is currently on in Copenhagen (and doing very well so I've heard). It's safe to say that he threw himself into his work during this time and this is apparent in the paintings where there's a definite development obvious in terms of both technique and concept.

Henrik (foreground) with Angus from Artizan discussing the print

His recent body of work seems to focus more on the narrative, and saw the artist introduce creatures into his foliage arrangements, such as grasshoppers, ants and beetles. The new print 'Red With Dragonflies' sees Henrik take this element of story into his print work for the first time as he uses dragonflies to symbolise change, regeneration and the beginning of summer. Screened delicately in an intensifying gold ink, the dragonflies buzz around creating an energy that pulsates from this print, reinforced by the combination of the turquoise blue leaves against the vibrant red backdrop. Another masterpiece from a talented artist and in my opinion, his best yet!

  
Henrik signing the edition

See the magic for yourself and buy online for £350 +VAT here.

I talked to Henrik about the new print and you can read the interview here.

Angie Davey
Creative director

Angie talks to Henrik Simonsen about his new Eyestorm publication 'Red With Dragonflies', launching online today.

Henrik Simonsen at Artizan print studio in Hove

Angie Davey: Your new screenprint, 'Red With Dragonflies', seems like it has more going on in it than previous prints such as 'Blue and Orange' and 'Yellow and Blue'. Was this intentional and do you feel it's a development in your print work?

Henrik Simonsen: I always aim to keep evolving in my work. The excitement of creation for me has always been linked to adding elements or to mix up existing elements in a new way. In 'Red With Dragonflies' I felt I was ready to try something more complex and I am really pleased with how it came together.

AD: Do you feel your screenprints move with your painting in terms of subject matter and style?

HS: There is a very interesting connection between the prints and the paintings. For me the paintings are the laboratories in terms of trying out new things. There are two main reasons for that. One is that I do the painting alone in my studio and I can spend as much time as I want on changing, altering and then maybe erasing it all depending on the result but in the print studio you are working with other people so you should have a fairly firm idea of 'what and how'. Also screen printing and paper is not a very forgiving way of working, it takes a lot of time and effort to get a layer down on paper when making the prints and once its there its permanent. Canvas allows more freedom for experimenting but then the prints benefits from all the lessons learned on the canvases.

AD: Can you talk about the narrative of the dragonflies; is there a story behind this piece as there is in paintings such as 'The Grasshopper and the Ant'?

HS: 'Red and Dragonflies' is not directly influenced by a story but while I was making the piece I read about the symbolism of the dragonfly, which is about change, regeneration and summer. That fitted so well with what I wanted the print to be about, and for that reason I felt that I had to have the dragonflies in there.

AD: Are the colours significant in meaning?

HS: My use of colour is determined by the mood and the charge I want the finished piece to have. Each colour brings its own personality and atmosphere so colours are very important. I found colours very difficult and for years I worked only in black and white but now I greatly appreciate the impact, significance and moods colours bring to the paintings.

AD: When you make the prints do they develop as you go along in the same way your paintings do, or do you have a pre-conceived idea of how the work will look before it's made?

HS: I touched on this above, when you go into the print studio, it is really helpful to have an idea in mind. When I start a new print with the printers [Artizan Editions in Hove, East Sussex], the starting point is often a digital sketch I have made using elements of paintings or done from a drawing I have worked on on the computer. We then talk through the possibilities and limitations in my choices and start to come up with a rough order of the layers. The reason for this is that there are certain things you can't do, or only do with great effort and extra work. For example, something I discovered when making this print was that its near impossible to print a bright, vibrant, transparent red onto any other colour other than white. So you really need to think the whole print through and decide on the order of the colours and this process often leads to changes and moderation in the original idea. As I wanted the red in this piece to be more vibrant in the centre, we printed white underneath to achieve the desired 'glow'. I'm lucky enough to be working with some fantastic printers at Artizan that often come up with new work processes to enable me to complete the print as I would like it. When making original screenprints there is a large element of responding to what each layer adds while not using more screens than you need and thereby sending production costs sky high, so you do need to think the process through in a manner that is not needed when working on a painting.

    
Red With Dragonflies by Henrik Siomonsen (left) and detail showing the dragonflies (right)

See the piece in more detail and buy online here

Grand Designs Live opened on Saturday at Excel London where we're showing some fantastic works by Polly Morgan, Damien Hirst and Henrik Simonsen amongst others. Come down and see us!

It's been a manic couple of days but we made it, the stand is assembled and (finally) looking good. I've never been to Excel and was actually pleasantly surprised when I arrived. Easy to get to from the DLR (it has it's own DLR station!), the place is huge and I think I've actually only seen the interiors section of the fair so far, which is about a quarter of the full event; the sheer scale of the place is pretty mind-blowing I have to say. When I left there at 7pm on Thursday night it was still quite difficult to imagine what it's going to look like when it's all complete due to the amount of different people working on different areas; art hangers, sign installers, carpet layers and electricians are all fighting for ladders and floor space and it was pretty much chaos for the whole of Thursday and most of Friday. We only had one hiccup with the hang at the Eyestorm stand; one of the Damien Hirst's we're showing, 'Painting By Numbers', which has been bespoke framed by John Jones in a beautiful (and heavy!) Perspex box especially for the show, was above the weight limit for the temporary walls, so we had to install it resting on the floor. It looks fantastic though and possibly best this way so it was all good in the end.

Still Birth by Polly Morgan

One of my favourite pieces we have on display is a taxidermy piece by Polly Morgan called Still Birth. Scarily fragile (I nearly had a breakdown taking it out of its packaging!), this piece is amazingly delicate and has already attracted a lot of attention from fellow fair installers. Featuring a single pheasant chick hanging peacefully from a single black balloon, this work is an iconic piece by Polly. While on the train home last night I read that the smaller in scale version of this piece with a red balloon and a quail chick, which in a larger edition of 150 and retails at £1,000 raised an amazing £7,500 at auction for the Teenage Cancer Trust on Thursday evening, so I am obviously not alone in my admiration for her work; the fact that her larger sculptures go for around £100,000 through Haunch of Venison of course is also proof of this. The piece we have is larger in size than the one that went in auction, in an edition of just 10 and selling for £3,900 +VAT. See it online here.

Angie Davey
Creative director

Grand Designs Live takes place at London's Excel and runs until Sunday 13th May. For more information click here.