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In this print I’m trying to recreate the experience of a cool, crisp and bright December day. The Summerhouse Plantation is a small wooded are in Ashton Court Estate. It has sheltered trails through it, made by walkers and other visitors. Here I am at the edge, in shadow, looking out at a bright sky, pale blue with fluffy white clouds. I used a sheer chine collé tissue with a gentle sheen to it, to capture the feeling of the sky. I used deep, dark marks scraped into the plate to try to emphasise the shadow and the feeling of looking out and up at the sky.
This body of work is based on the book by Suzanne Simard, Finding the Mother Tree. Trees communicate via mycorrhizal fungi to trade water and other nutrients. Ancient and mature trees nurture their offspring via these networks, as well as trading nutrients between other species. Botanist Simard has spent years working on this theory as part of a wider body of work, discovering what it means for forests, the climate and the wider Anthropocene.
