Hugh Scott-Douglas

Hugh Scott-Douglas

Work from Sitzprobe at Croy Nielsen, Berlin.

“…relates back to engineering circles at the turn of last century who employed it to create Blueprints (the name “blueprint” stems specifically from the distinct cyan colour which this technique produces). These works begin their genealogy as perfect vectors, plotted on the computer, and printed as digital negatives which are then laid over a textile impregnated with a photosensitive solution comprised of Ammonium iron(III) citrate and Potassium ferricyanide. These arrangements are then taken from the studio and laid out in the sun. Thrust into a cosmic contingency, atmospheric elements assist and interfere with the translation of these print from their perfect vector form to the real. These otherwise perfect geometric motifs of lines, dots and squares are violated by the very catalyst necessary for them to exist. The traditional concerns of a painter are thrown out the window as the success, chroma, and definition of each painting varies based on an almost endless number of ecological factors including the amount of UV in the atmosphere on a given day, wind, the time of day the print is made, cloud cover and the amount of time the fabric is rinsed. This print, which crystallizes as a flat textile is then given form through its translation from a 2 dimensional textile to an object by its immigration to a stretcher bar.” – Hugh Scott-Douglas