The organisers of Art Melbourne, Single Market Events, kindly invited Buku Larrnggay Print Space and Basil Hall Editions to share a stand at the recent Art Melbourne event in May. In return, our printers worked tirelessly on the press (loaned by Melbourne Etching Supplies) for three days to demonstrate colour etching printing techniques. Mats, Basil, Barrata, Dhapanbal and Ruby took it in turns to ink up a number of new plates done for our 2011 Collectors’ Folio Series V by the Yunupingu sisters , Gulumbu, Nyapanyapa and Barrapu. During the allotted demonstration times, a three plate colour Garry Shead etching was run through by Mats and Basil, much to the delight of the passing onlookers.
Around 80 galleries, including a number of Art Centres from NT, WA and SA exhibited, so competition was fierce. We were very happy with the interest shown by the considerable crowds and sales of our smaller items were fairly brisk. Buku reported steady sales too. After a long final day on the Sunday, we had to take down the entire show and box it up for collection by 10am the following day. Thankfully, around half of the framed prints were to remain in Melbourne, so the job was efficiently done by the exhausted crew.
Many thanks to the Buku mob, especially Annie Studd, the new Print Shop co-ordinator, for organising the stand with us. Many thanks also to volunteer, Andrew Weatherill, from RMIT, who was everywhere, helping in the set up and the bump out, taking photos (seen here), collecting things we needed locally and providing tools and expertise!
The Art Melbourne people have reported that many very favourable comments had been made about our elegant stand and our enthusiastic demonstrations so congratuulations to all the printers.
