Deborah Klein's Art Blog: A.I.R. at Geelong Grammar School

From next Monday I begin a much anticipated nine-day residency at Geelong Grammar School. My period as artist-in-residence was originally scheduled for 2020, but was placed on hold when the first of the lockdowns began. The residency was rescheduled for 2021, but in the meantime, I got sick.

Recently the A.I.R. was postponed for a further week when I caught a particularly nasty dose of flu. It’s hard to believe the residency is happening at long last. Most of this week has been spent in preparation and I’m still not there yet. The school is keen for me to show developments in the work. In part, this has involved digging through my disgracefully messy plan drawers and excavating some hoary old works in order to share something of my journey.

Coincidentally, that’s the title of the humble hand-coloured linocut dating from 1995 that’s pictured above. Heaven only knows what messages are contained in the bottles.

All of the prints featured in this post were hand-burnished with a spoon, a method which, in my experience, is considerably slower but infinitely more satisfying and far less problematic than printing with a press.

Top: Journey, 1995, linocut, hand coloured, 15.24 x 10.26 cm.

Directly below: a selection of relief prints made during the same period that will also travel with me to Geelong.