Paul Catherall – Gherkin (2005)

Subject Matter

In this lino print, Paul Catherall has portrayed the Gherkin, and as we can see, it looks very un-colourful due to the lack of colours being used. Catherall only used black, grey and white to paint this lino print, which all look similar in my vision. This makes the Gherkin look dark next to the white sky behind it, but also reflective and shiny, as represented by the white surface area of the building. The atmosphere of the artwork looks windy and rainy, as represented by the boring grey colours, and this is the typical weather in London, which might be the reason why the artwork was done using these colours. I believe that this is another aspect that Catherall is trying to communicate.

Technique

Paul Caulfield did this artwork by lino printing and I think that it was the best method to producing something like this. Some of the lines are thin and they represent detail, but, as this is a small lino print of a big building, all the other marks are drawn in bulks of paint. The artwork has a certain level of depth applied to it, and this is represented by the building next to the gherkin. We can see that it is rounded by the way the outlines are drawn; they go outwards and down. As I have mentioned before, the artwork is drawn by using just black, grey and white, but this represents that the building is drawn from light areas to darker ones, and this increases the tonal range, and making the image look more satisfying and inspiring. The dark colours and light reflections on the building makes the lino print look flat and neat, also represented by the smooth and rounded shapes and lines that compose the image.

Career

Paul Catherall is a London-based printmaker and illustrator. From the late 1990s he has worked predominantly in linocuts. His prints beautifully reconstructed urban landscapes and architectural details. They build up seemingly abstract blocks of colour into perfectly balanced compositions, which unite as one representational whole. Cezanne and Sickert have been a recurrent influence on his use of colour and construction of form. He also greatly admires the progressive commercial designers of the 1920s and 1930s, particularly Edward Mcknight Kauffer and Tom Purvis. His work has featured on posters and book covers for British Airways, Marks & Spencer, Bloomsbury and Harper Collins.

Links with own Work

Paul Catherall’s work links very well with mine as I love drawing buildings and architectural details and when I was doing lino printing, I extremely enjoyed the task. I like how he produces landscapes of London and other buildings in London, and I enjoy doing transcripts of his work even though I didn’t use his method of lino printing in this task. His work also links well with Edward Wadsworth, another artist that did lino printing and that I studied.