ARTS + ENTERTAINMENT
KENT ARTIST PROFILE
SUE SCULLARD
SINCE FIRST APPEARING IN THE JUNE 2017 ISSUE OF insideKENT, SUE SCULLARD’ S WORK HAS CONTINUED TO EVOLVE IN SKILL AND PASSION. INSPIRED BY THE NATURAL WORLD, SHE CREATES FINELY DETAILED ENGRAVINGS THAT CELEBRATE KENT’ S NATURAL LANDSCAPE AND THE WIDER COUNTRYSIDE BEYOND.
Since we last spoke to you in 2017, how has your work developed? I’ ve always been inspired by the English landscape and I’ ve continued to be fascinated by woodlands, particularly ancient trees and woodland flowers, so my recent engravings have concentrated on these themes. I enjoy country walks and visiting gardens with my camera; I have plenty of reference material to spark ideas to keep me going for years. I’ ve recently engraved a scene I recorded 30 years ago. I work very slowly, partly due to the characteristics of wood engraving as a medium and partly due to changes in my eyesight. The more recent prints have become even more intricate, so I always have far more ideas for future work than I’ ll ever be able to carry out.
With wood being your primary material for engraving, what species do you use and why? I engrave my images onto end-grain woodblocks especially made for this particular form of printmaking. My favourite is English boxwood. I buy them from a specialist blockmaker, the only one in Britain, who is himself a wood engraver. The woodblocks are expensive and it can be intimidating to make the first cut into a new one! Box is a small tree, so some larger blocks have to be made from several sections joined together and then finished to a beautiful smooth surface which is a delight to carve with a variety of specialist fine tools, each making characteristic marks, and I find it the most
reassuringly accurate wood to work with. I bought my first tools as a student 45 years ago and have also inherited a set from my college teacher and mentor, who also gave me some uncut woodblocks and a beautiful Victorian printing press. In Victorian times, most newspaper and book illustrations were produced as wood engravings and now there are just a few specialists making limited edition books with letterpress text and woodblock illustrations.
What has been one of your most memorable projects since 2017? Each one seems memorable while I’ m working on it- and all are a challenge. I’ m cutting the white marks out of a black surface and I need to think more carefully than I would if I were drawing with a pen on paper as any mistakes cannot be undone, so it’ s very satisfying to complete something without a panic along the way, especially a complex image. Sometimes I make a composite design from several reference pictures, and again, it’ s good to see it work when it’ s finally finished and ready to print. I think my Weathered Chestnut, with its complicated web of branches, was the most memorable, especially as I was engraving the white spaces between those branches rather than the black lines. My engravings of the planting at Great Dixter and Sissinghurst were also challenging, with the clusters of flowers and foliage interlocking with each other, making them work in black and white while the reality is so colourful.
What has been your favourite place or landscape to take inspiration from in Kent? I regularly visit Knole Park, Penshurst, Bedgebury Pinetum, Scotney Castle, Hole Park and Sissinghurst Gardens, and always come home with lots of inspiring photos to work from, especially of the trees. Knole Park has such amazing chestnut trees, which have all sorts of fascinating encrustations on their bark. I’ ve made some drawings and I’ m looking forward to developing these as engravings. The Hole Park bluebells are wonderful, too.
What has been your longest project undertaken, from engraving to final print? In 2002, I did a set of illustrations for the Lives of the Later Caesars, which took 14 months to finish 16 engravings at about 100 hours for each, plus a lot of research. In 2008, I illustrated Lark Rise to Candleford, which also took more than a year. I work even more slowly now, so I just create one image at a time. Each engraving involves lots of sketches to work out the design, then an outline tracing to transfer onto the block as a guide. Once the engraving is‘ finished’, I might need to make some adjustments after the first printing, so it takes longer than just the engraving time; maybe six weeks or more.
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