Behind the Screen Print : Lily Blakely
Don’t tell the other screen prints but this is one of my favourite prints of the year. When we approached local legend Lily Blakely to be involved in our imprint series we couldn’t wait to see what she was going to send us.
Lily is an illustrator and comic artist based in Norwich, UK. She draws primarily with brush and ink, adding colour digitally. Since graduating in 2018, she's worked on projects spanning editorial illustration to book illustration to album and merch design. Her passion lies in narrative work and comics, publishing her debut comic "Gristle" in 2021 with Shortbox.
“Plants and biophilia are consistent themes throughout her work, often taking over industrial spaces or working in symbiosis with human bodies. The concept of nature's reckoning - plants pushing back against their destruction in the constant and persisting industrialisation of earth - features heavily in her artwork, either in beautiful, illustrative print work or surreal body horror.”
We discovered Lily through her risograph prints so it was exciting to take this work and give it everything that screen printing could do. Things like neon blends and gloss aren’t possible with riso so we wanted to try this immediately. We had Lily come by the studio once we had produced a few proofs, so that she could decide which blend suited best. The blend is achieved by taking two colours and physically mixing them on the screen. Once the print is pulled a few times the two tones mix seamlessly into each other. This effect often looks best when the inks are a similar colour, for example red and yellow rather than purple and green.
We pulled all the tricks out of the bag for this print. For the final 2 layers (yellow windows and black line) we switched from matt to gloss ink. Swapping the finish meant the line made the building pop out from the background. The yellow neon gloss gives the print a life and glow that makes it uniquely beautiful in person.
It was a pleasure to flex our screen printing muscles on this work, we threw it all at the wall and in our opinion it really paid off. Thank you Lily for giving us this opportunity!
Pick up the print here: www.wellniceprints.com/print-shop/p/biophilia-by-lily-blakely
Check out Lily Blakely here: www.lilybla.co.uk
