Pattern Design

Cyanotype image of wallpaper design printed on handmade kozo paper

You can find pattern design everywhere in nature. From flowers to cloud formations, the complexity of patterns made and repeated is like a divine kaleidoscope of infinite possibilities and interconnections.

I love the way that patterns can be interpreted in art through repetitive motifs, geometric shapes and twirling arabesques. Wallpaper designs are great examples of how art could be papered onto walls as a cultural status symbol and refinement.

I used one of these wallpaper motifs on a cyanotype print I made during my residency in Oatlands, Tasmania. It reminded me of the first cyanotypes I made using lace and doilies to honour my maternal heritage of handed down clothing and linen tableware.

Cyanotypes are such a simple way of creating positive prints without a lot of equipment. All you need is the chemical solution and sunlight. You can print on a variety of surfaces including paper, cardboard and cloth. The equipment is lightweight and portable.

You can even make fantastic prints with limited sunlight as I discovered in Iceland in 2022 during my residency at the Fish Factory Creative Arts Centre in Stöðvarfjörður. It just takes a bit longer to expose the images to the light. My favourite repeated motif I used when there were rocks and stones I had collected and placed on long banners of rice paper. The white shapes and shadows these created looked like icebergs floating in arctic waters.

I further experimented with cut out stencils for cyanotype exposures when I was in the UK in 2023. I cut out circles, added grid squares and used images from road signs to create figures in my landscapes.  These cyanotypes became the headers for my 2024 calendar.

I was looking at the September calendar picture hanging up on the kitchen wall and felt this strange blue figure printed onto a pain medication box was an premonition of my future self.

Walking up and down the hilly streets in England had necessitated taking regular pain medication for my knee. Fast forward to a year on and this figure is me now recovering from knee surgery, still taking pain medication and very wobbly walking. 

I had hoped to start more cyanotype printing this week and cleared out a shelf under my studio desk to put coated papers to dry on in the dark. However that didn’t quite happen and I am left with only the idea of what I want to do but have not yet accomplished.

I have collected all my recent pain medication boxes to print on and love the repetitive shapes of the flattened out boxes, each a bit similar in shape but different in size.

I also have handmade paper circles I made during the 2020 pandemic. Circle after circle of white paper shaped by embroidery hoops. They have been sitting in my paper drawers waiting for the right project.

These could be the ones to become wallpaper motifs or maybe they will be printed with stencilled figure shapes. I have so many pattern designs for the future still waiting to come to fruition.

Cyanotype stencil printed on a pain medication box which became my September 2024 calendar pic.