Jane Cockayne: Workshop Bursary Blog

15 Aug

Written By Toogs

We’ve had the great company of Shetland artist Jane Cockayne in the workshop recently as she got to know the risograph printer during her Gaada Workshop Bursary.

Jane generously shared her experience with us:

“Almost a year ago I noticed that Gaada was advertising for applicants for their bursary programme and I did not need any persuading to apply! At the time I was busy planning & delivering a number of creative projects and I dreamed of a quiet space where I could work on a personal project and learn new skills. I was delighted when I heard that my application had been accepted and put the dates for the sessions into my diary. My expectations were very open and I was happy to experiment with any medium that Gaada could offer. During my first session, Daniel introduced me to one of Gaada's beloved family members - the risograph. I decided to use my sessions to get to know this magical printing machine and create some illustrations for a short story that was beginning to bubble in my head. I found that between my sessions I spent a lot of time writing and developing the characters for the story and I was a bit worried about what Daniel might think as I knew that the bursary was for 'visual arts' and not for creative writing. Daniel was very supportive and understood that the sessions gave me a focus for my personal creativity and without them the story of 'Wilder and the Njuggle' would not have been born. Daniel showed me how to develop some of my sketches so that they could be made into risograph prints. It was fun learning how to split the images into layers and how to think about what colours of ink would work. I had expected to produce a whole book full of illustrations but I found that just learning how the risograph worked took up a lot of time. Over the course of the sessions, I began to see the endless possibilities and potential of the risograph and I feel that it has given me ideas for developing illustrations in the future. For me, the most rewarding parts of the bursary were having protected time for my own creativity and meeting Daniel and Vivian who were very encouraging and open to supporting me exactly where I was at!”