Katya Timoshenko
I met Katya in Brighton, at a collaborative event I was hosting with a dear sister in sound of mine, Tabather. Since then I’ve enjoyed welcoming Katya regularly to Group Sound Meditations and over time we have become friends.
Katya is a Ukranian artist, a print maker who works at the Middlesex University and is part of the Royal Society of Painter-Printmakers. Katya’s work is really interesting and personally, I find it very calming. I think there is something that strikes a calm chord in me. If I had to put a finger on it, I think it is to do with something between the relationship of the precise nature of the etching process used to make the printing plates, and then the colours that are combined with that precise technique. You should definitely head to Katya’s Instagram page here to see some of her fantastic work!
What is Suminagashi?
I’ve always wanted to get creative with water, colours and vibrations so when Katya mentioned that we should have a play around with some inks and my singing bowls, I felt like she had read my mind! I was so excited to give this a go. The technique Katya had in mind was Suminagashi, which is the ancient Japanese technique of decorating paper with inks. It’s believed to be the oldest form of marbling and is really, quite relaxing – meditative actually!
How does it work?
Coloured in ink is dropped into the water using the tip of a paint brush. A second brush with a dispersing agent is then used to create separation between what begins to form as rings of colour. Our thoughts were that we could ‘load’ the singing bowl with these coloured rings and then activate the bowl to see what happens to the ink.
We quickly learnt that the water in the bowl needed time, a lot more time than one would think to really let the water settle before we began the process. The kettle went on and cups of tea were enjoyed while we waited – Katya introduced me to the many plants that felt like they were slowly taking over the window ledge and nearby desks. There was something quite nice about the potted green pals amongst some very old, heavy printing machinery.
Back to bowls and patterns – We tried a few different set ups. Water and inks inside the bowls, then water and inks outside of the bowls, in a larger container. The later was less fruitful, but the water and inks inside the bowl was really fun! At first, we used a black ink that completely filtered away when the vibrations of the bowl began. Katya remembered a blue ink that was a little more elastic in its make-up, so we gave that a try and it did survive the vibrations much better.
Patterns – Cymatics
At first, I didn’t think anything of the types of patterns that we were capturing. Something magical happens when you see the water and ink start to vibrate – you surf the wave of not wanting to destroy the layer of ink sitting on the top of the water, but enjoying seeing how the vibrations make it dance! The pattern you begin to see in the water in the gif above is Cymatics. “Cymatics is a subset of modal vibrational phenomena. The term was coined by Swiss physician Hans Jenny. Typically the surface of a plate, diaphragm, or membrane is vibrated, and regions of maximum and minimum displacement are made visible in a thin coating of particles, paste, or liquid.” Rabbit hole anyone? More on Cymatics here. Ps – it’s a beautiful rabbit hole.
I enjoyed looking at the drying marbled papers and all of a sudden I noticed a kind of compression in the patterns. If you take a look at the four images below, you might notice that on 2,3 and 4. As if four areas in the bowl were pushing inwards. Can you see that? Number 1 is an example of us getting carried away and the ink being to disturbed by the vibrations, but still really lovely! I think this kind of pattern is as close as we might get to something ‘consistent’ given the tools we had – not that we were shooting for anything in particular. Katya and I had a fun evening playing and that was result enough! Don’t forget to play friends. We have some more ideas that we would like to try in this realm, so stay tuned.
