By Laura Nelson
Home is where I want to be
But I guess I'm already there
'This Must Be The Place'. Talking Heads.
Over the last few years, Laura Nelson has immersed herself fully in the art of signwriting, an age-old practice enjoying something of a renaissance in recent years. Her studio is filled with brushes - each dedicated to a specific technique, bristles gently shaped with baby oil to hold the distinctive shapes of rigger, chisel, fitch and sword liner - and miniature pots of 1 Shot lettering enamel, glass panels, silkscreens, sheets of block and casual script, delicate pamphlets of temperamental 23 carat gold leaf and bottles of size. Considering the sheer number of techniques and scripts involved, and equipment and materials to be sourced, Laura has acquired a level of mastery in a remarkably short space of time. Reverse glass gilding is generally viewed as the pinnacle of signwriting techniques, it is an intricate process requiring a very high level of skill.
What first catches the eye, and the light like precious objects in a Coptic or Greek Orthodox church, Laura's work shimmers in even the lowest light, reflecting everything in tones of red gold, green gold, copper, silver and various juicy shades of enamel. It is an effect one's eyes and brain can handle, but one which is almost impossible to photograph and therefore the works necessitate being experienced and appreciated in person. This piece is based on a photograph taken by Laura in the forest of her son Reuben. Nelson's children are grown up, but these outings are a tradition they have retained and still enjoy as a family unit. This piece acts like a personal visual diary entry, yet the work has a resonance that moves beyond the artist's personal family.
The gold leaf has been applied in the traditional manner but with the added complexity of silkscreen printing in order to translate the photographic imagery via bitmapping, inverting and flipping. It is a complex and time-consuming procedure that Laura employs masterfully, while at the same time embracing the quirks of handling fiddly and delicate materials. Cracks and patches of non-gilded areas, which in the practice of pure signwriting would be buffed or scratched away by the artist and additional leaf applied, are here folded into each piece, emphasised even with the subsequent reverse application of black or blue enamel paint. It somehow makes the piece, conversely, simultaneously timeless and modern. Reuben depicts Nelson's son, gazing out at the viewer with a subtle expression of bemusement and cupping a handful of mushrooms. It is a portrait but also, given the relative size of the subject within the composition, a figure in a landscape, originally a forest. Yet here the landscape framing the figure has been replaced with sheets of gold leaf, the hairline cracks emphasised with black back painting suggesting branches and trees, and in one small area on the left forming concentric rings like tree rings or a stylised sun. From across the room, the pattern reminds one of the bark of a silver birch. In another piece the large expanse of gold, silhouetting a bare tree and bathing the figures in backlit halos, is a crisp winter sunlight.
Gold has a long history in the history of art in painting, sculpture and illuminated manuscripts in Western and Eastern art. Like lapis lazuli, the blue rock mined in Afghanistan, gold was a precious material reserved for the most sumptuous manuscripts, representations of divinities and saints in the form of panel paintings and icons. As discussed, Nelson's use of the material stems from her signwriting training, but its application here to an intimate portrait elevates it far beyond the original photograph. The care and attention the technique requires turns these memories and private family moments into a precious object itself, preserving moments for the future. Laura thinks that the work is so deeply personal, and almost cathartic it will become a new entry in an inventory of tender memories; new precious objects, indeed songlines, celebrating family and time - a lifetime - shared together. It is hard to think of more noble subjects to hold on to and honour in this way. Memories and family; in the end what else really matters?