Woodcut walkthrough – Russian Dolls
Take a look behind the scenes as I walk you through the development of my Russian Dolls, one part of my exhibition piece for the recently completed Folk show at Gallery at the Station.
Working out the dimensions
First, I needed to work out the dimensions of each of my dolls. To do this, I first measured the wood I would be cutting from and then decided on the size I wanted for the biggest doll. From there I found a reference image of an existing set of a Russian doll line up which I placed next to my largest doll size and then sized the rest accordingly.
Cut, sand and undercoat
Once I had the sizing set, I created some simple grey template shapes for each doll, which I traced onto my wood so I could start cutting. For the cutting, I used a newly purchased scroll saw which made the cuts pretty easy! Once cut, I sanded each and then gave them an undercoat.
Sketch my design onto my templates
I created each sketch using pencil and paper before scanning it into Illustrator where I tidied the sketches up, duplicated parts, tried colour options and finally printed out true-to-scale copies ready to transfer to the wood.
Choosing colours
Once the dolls were set up, I needed to decide on the colours I would use. I wanted to keep colours consistent between the dolls and use a restricted palette.
Undercoating and transferring design
After undercoating, I painted a couple of coats of the cream base colour each doll would have, before transferring the design onto the wood. For transferring I used carbon paper.
First colour
Yellow first. I didn’t realise it before choosing the colour but yellow ended up needed three coats per doll! Especially when mixing with the carbon dust. If I was to do this again, I would definitely rub the carbon away before painting!
Second colour
Red. Although all of the features weren’t painted yet, the overall design was starting to come together!
Third colour
Teal. My favourite colour of the lot. This went on much nicer and was a pleasure to paint.
Fourth colour
Brown. This was the finishing touch and tied each of the dolls together nicely.
Rookie error!
I completely forgot about the back of each doll, I couldn’t leave them blank! With time running out, I reapplied my initial design transfer to the back of each doll, adapting each to illustrate the back of each doll. A last-minute headache that involved yet more multiple coats of paint but well worth it to finish each doll off and make them look more authentic.
Varnish
Always my favourite part of any sign job, varnishing! The hard, tricky part is done, now it’s time to make it shine!
Delivered to the exhibition space
It was a nice feeling to get these out of my studio and into the exhibition space. A lot of effort went into them and I was pleased with the final result in the end.
