Frances Walker, Aberdeen review - 'Walker is a master and this show is an enduring pleasure'

Now in her nineties, Frances Walker’s latest exhibition sees her delving into a range of printmaking processes, writes Susan Mansfield

Frances Walker: a selection of print works from Peacock, 2010-2022, The Print Room, 252 Union Street, Aberdeen ****

Frances Walker was one of the founder members of Aberdeen’s Peacock & the Worm (previously Peacock Printmakers, then Peacock Visual Arts), which turned 50 in June, and she continues her connection with the printmaking workshop into her nineties. A selection of her prints from the last 14 years is now on show at Peacock’s Print Room (252 Union Street), including works made during lockdown in socially distanced collaboration with the workshop technicians.

Walker is a master and this show is an enduring pleasure, as we observe her delving into a range of printmaking processes to get the results she wants, whether the subject is a line drawing of rocks at Achmelvick or a sweep of ocean in saturated blue. There is work inspired by her earlier travels to the Antarctic and Svalbard, as well as long-term inspirations such as the Isle of Tiree.

Antarctic Refuge Hut, 2000, by Frances Walker

Many of the works are in panoramic format: the wooden walkways across the bog at Finlaggan on Islay; the long curve of an Antarctic shore, complete with penguins; a wide sweep of coastline approaching Cruden Bay which takes in several different weathers. But this skill with wide open spaces is matched by a work like ‘Tiree Window’ which glimpses a square of the outside world from the dark interior of a cottage.

Until 31 August