Louise McNiff • May 1 - 30

“Steep gritstone edges look down onto deep sweeping valleys. Patches of tree belt, stone walls and hedges fragment the land. Ancient rock formations and abandoned mill stones are scattered across the vast open moorland”

The starting point for Louise’s work, is the numerous drawings she makes whilst out walking on the eastern moors of the Peak District. She is drawn to the shapes of ancient rock formations and the ever-changing colours in the distinctive Derbyshire landscape. She often spends hours walking and drawing, then returns to her studio with a rucksack full of sketches. Back in the studio these sketchbook drawings form the reference point for her work. When printmaking Louise uses a combination of monoprint, screenprint and collage techniques making each print a unique one-off piece.

When working with clay, Louise uses techniques which draw on her background as a printmaker. Sgraffito lines are etched into leather-hard clay using handmade tools. Coloured slips are transferred like a monoprint, painted and stencilled to build layers of mark making and colour. Louise has an intuitive and painterly approach to the composition. She continues to build layers of surface until she feels that she has reached the balance of colour, shape, and line to express the experience of the landscape she wishes to convey. She fires to stoneware temperature for the final firing in an electric kiln.

Louise McNiff is a Derbyshire based, ceramicist printmaker and painter. She has a BA in Fine Art from the University of Central Lancashire and a PGCE in Art and Design, completed at John Moore’s University, Liverpool. Following college she worked, part-time, as Technician and Teacher, in the Art Department of a large secondary school. In 2015 she moved back to Derbyshire and began to dedicate more time to her own practice.