KNOTS

Etched, dry point, stamped, relief prints and a fascination with knots and their language.

Ashley’s Book of Knots is a tome of common and obscure knots, illustrated and recorded as a history of, and working manual for, knots and ropes. The descriptions are anthropomorphic and slightly visceral e.g. a Shroud-laid rope has four strands and a heart - the ends are whipped. This evocative and provocative text became a point of interest for me, an exploration using language as a starting point.

In the catalogue essay for the exhibition Maritime, Tess Horwitz describes this fascination:

Barbara McConchie has delved into Ashley’s [Book of Knots] to find names for knots that evoke meanings beyond functionality and suggest human emotions and relationships. Knot terminology such as a a “snug hitch'' and “sister yarns” allude to the formation of entwined relationships. Other names such as “constrictor knots” and “the shroud knot” connote the negative sides of relationship: the struggle between two separate identities, the losses involved in forming a unit. By using a variety of printmaking techniques that suggest sensuousness and struggle, hard and soft, McConchie uses surface properties to express the layering of meanings within the works.

Image credits: Photography B McConchie

T- B and L - R

Bound (detail), mezzotint, drypoint, dimensions variable, 1999. Photo: Courtesy the artist
Floating knot, aquatint, spitbite, 270 mm H x 270mm W, 1999. Photo: Courtesy of the artist.
Ashley, Clifford. W, The Ashley Book of Knots, Doubleday Press, 1944, title page.
Ashley, Clifford. W, The Ashley Book of Knots, Doubleday Press, 1944. L - R pp 15; 27; 219; 425.
Shroud laid rope with a heart, linocut, 2000
Splicing 4 strands, linocut, 2000
Details from the installation Bound, mezzotint, drypoint, stamping, dimensions variable, 1999
Not Knots, woodcut, frottage, stamping, watercolour, 1175 mm H x 1050 mm W