Artists Eye     Mary Louise Coulouris
When I was at Hayters Atelier 17, I used to think there was a magical ingredient in the process of etching/printmaking, so that somehow, with the whiz and crackle of acid on plate, the interaction of the needle, the artist and the press something magical and beautiful would emerge. Although my prints at that time were well received, I now think it needs more conscious effort to produce such special results.

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"Còmpeta"   30"x40" S/screen

It is interesting to think about the nature of creativity however. It is not a touch of magic from without, although it seems like it at times. You hear creative people, musicians particularly, talking about the music "working through" them. I think it must be something to do with a mental process which starts from a logical rationalist approach and builds on this until it becomes intuitive, leaps to a higher plane in a way that is satisfying but not clear.

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"Arrival"   23"x30" Litho

Times when I have pushed myself farthest with this method, such as when I designed the main Children's Play Area at the Glasgow Garden Festival, in my Ecology Triptych or in my designs for Sainsbury's Wine Labels, it has worked well. So this is why I use the mimesis method of observing and recording in parallel with other approaches. I feel objective observation is useful but not enough.

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many alternatives available

All 3 "Triptych" Prints £300

"Ecology Triptych I" Relief Print

David Woodford in his "Artists Eye" in the June issue of Arts Review 1997 says "Fine Art's practitioners might usefully be divided into two camps. The message makers use image in the service of idea, the musical painters use the components purely as sensuality." I suppose I have conflicting aims in that I want to create a beautiful picture surface and communicate an idea.

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"Icons"   39"x30" S/screen

Even when I am using the objective method, observing a landscape, putting down what I see or what I want to see in front of me, there still comes a point when I want to turn away from the subject and make my work more like one aspect of the reality that interest me. Somewhere along the line I decided that painting is about colour and drawing is about line. From then on painting became an exciting voyage of discovery, juggling coloured shapes in pictorial space, mixing colours obsessively, making colours work for me to shape form, pushing forward and back. It meant canvases speaking to me asking for colours to solve problems.
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"Greek Landscape"   30"x22" S/screen
Recently when working on a public art commission to design three carpets for the Scottish Poetry Library I found the enlightened policy of the commissioning committee of having artists 'on board' at an early stage in the planning and available for any of the specified sites very creative. It meant that I was able to enter an entirely new field with new challenges and design problems.