By Stephen Cranston

I became a lifelong admirer of the Isenheim Altarpiece (above) after chancing upon a book about Matthias Grünewald when I was teenager. It’s a multi-layered and multi-panelled work of weird and wonderful gruesome beauty. While working on a personal project in 2016 with a commitment to making one collage for each fortnight of the year, I saw that I had an opportunity to create my own altarpiece.

And that’s when the project started...

Prior to this project, most of my collages had been created on-the-fly, but this one was going to take some preparation. To roughly match the silhouette of the Isenheim, I settled upon the pentaptych format. Employing a method of free association, responding to my bank of images as though wearing Renaissance retro-spectacles, I plotted the composition of the three main panels simultaneously. The brief I had set myself that year was to create aesthetically pleasing images that become disturbing upon closer inspection, and that each consecutive collage should be more complex than its predecessor.

Work on the first three panels of the altarpiece was a joy and all went surprisingly smoothly. However, I was stumped as to what to do with the top and bottom panels. Ordinarily these things just pop into my head and I’d expected some sort of an idea to form while working on the main three. If I remember correctly, I was in the middle of a dumbbell floor press when the idea finally hit me of creating Penrose triangles suspended in mid-air. I’d never even drawn one before, but I can remember fathoming how I could assemble them, whilst lifting. The idea of using a hexagon in a semicircular panel came at the same time. I was very excited by this, and I think I may have even got to work learning how to draw them that night. A few days later I had completed ‘The Shepherd Lord’: my first pentaptych paper collage.

As it got closer to the end of the year, with lots of collages in between, I decided that, because I’d had such an enjoyable time making it, I would construct another pentaptych. I liked the idea of creating a narrative, and given the appearance of religious artwork, I thought something akin to the Stations of the Cross that can be seen in some churches, was the way to go. To reinforce the notion that these were part of a series I decided to use the exact same dimensions as the first.

A lot of the composition of pentaptych number two happened during quiet spells at the day job. It took a considerable amount of time finding the images and papers required to match the vision in pencil, but I managed to source everything from my image bank. I was all set to have it completed before the year was up, when I discovered I was missing one piece to complete the right-side panel. It was infuriating because, up until this point, I’d been obsessively focused on getting the collage finished, at the expense of all Christmas activities, so I could bring in 2017 with a sense of achievement and a few celebratory ales.

I can remember staring at it, feeling a bit despondent while sitting at my cutting desk, when from out of nowhere (again), I had the idea of a star polygon with something trapped inside it. I had a book when I was a kid called The World Atlas of Mysteries. It had dodecahedron frames with chameleons inside them, suspended in space, on the cover, and it had clearly made an impression. Because it’s me, a regular star polygon wasn’t going to be enough and I decided to create a crooked Penrose star. I’d already made an attempt at a Penrose pentagram sometime after ‘The Shepherd Lord’, so I had a rough idea of how to go about it.

2017 didn’t start for me until the second of January, not completing ‘The King of Glory’ until about six that morning. I was particularly proud of this one, my favourite part at the time being the right-hand panel.

I don't know if it was down to the day job, or as a result of a lot of cutting through multiple layers of paper with a scalpel, but I developed a fairly painful case of lateral epicondylitis, better known as tennis elbow. I have heard of at least one collage artist having to change medium because of this, and I didn’t know how things were going to work out for me. Instead of cutting I spent my free time designing and drawing templates for more Penrose stars. I’d had such a buzz from making the first one, and the inclusion of the tentacled thing within, that I felt inspired to create more. With a dozen designs prepared, a month of rest and an elbow clasp to wear, I got to work.

‘The Key (Left Side)’ and ‘The Key (Right Side)’ (pictured below) were completed in July that year. I’m very proud of these two. I’d been soaking up influences and had stumbled upon illustrations of The Lesser Key of Solomon. My ‘key’ was a kind of guide to the demons you might find in a fey version of scenic Britain – the landscapes all sourced from photogravure tourist guidebooks of the 1950s. I had emulated the magic and mysticism of alchemical illustrations I’d looked at during my art school days by introducing sacred geometry, Penrose impossible geometry, and presenting them as multi-panel polyptych altarpieces, intertwining the semiotics of the renaissance with the esotericism of alchemy and the occult. I was also burnt out. A chaotic period at work along with a string of injuries and illnesses followed, and my energy to make art waned. Like a pound shop Marcel Duchamp, giving up art for chess, I packed-in collage art for Warhammer!

The Key (Left Side)_2017_paper collage_Stephen Cranston.jpg

The Key (Right Side)_2017_paper collage_Stephen Cranston.jpg

Five and a half years later and an accident requiring the assistance of Mountain Rescue and six months of recovery away from work, resulted in better head space and a return to the cutting table whilst off work. Rather than going through any angsty turmoil conjuring up an idea from scratch, I simply picked up from where I had left off and got back to the Penrose star polygons.

The first ‘There is No Through Road to Diabeg’ was a more symmetrical version of a previous design (which I then gifted to my physio). From that point on I pushed the design and complexity further which each successive collage; the following three ‘Austere Mountaingirt’, ‘Cocks & Candles in the Cellar’, Mindcontrolling Fortune Teller’, and ‘Mother Shipton’s Queerly Shaped Cave’.

The more complex the designs, the harder they become to untangle for the viewer. I like the way they blend in and out of the background. I enjoy the sensation of feeling lost in the design and I thrive off the challenge to solve it.

I have contemplated the significance of this and I think that at least part of my attraction to it is the similarity to the scintillating scotoma I sometimes experience. I believe some people get them while suffering a migraine headache, which fortunately for me, I do not. I have however, had the ‘excitement’ of experiencing them while out solo-hiking. Would not recommend. (I do recommend you look them up if unaware).

I returned to work, and after six months of nonsense with no energy to collage again, I quit. One month after that and I was making art again and have continued to do so ever since.

The workshop where I worked had no windows and the only way to get any sunlight through the day was to grab a few minutes during a quiet period and stand outside the shutters for some vitamin D. It just so happens that opposite the shutters is Ebor Studio (a collective art space). It’s not that I was intentionally looking that way, but I must have gazed at that place for years. I’d known the director well enough to say hello when passing, and she had invited me to apply for membership several times over the course of ten years or so. After leaving the job, I bumped into her again, and this time I took up her invitation and applied.

At the time of writing I’ve been a member for almost a year. In that time I’ve been part of an associate members show for which I made ‘Salmon of Knowledge’ (a polygon made entirely out of photogravure seascapes); had a sneaky last minute solo show; made ‘Hear the Screaming in the Trees’ (again, entirely created using photogravures) for the cover of the Autumn/Winter programme; and become an active member of the community there. I’ve recently had two proposals for exhibitions approved: one a collaborative project with a photographer to be exhibited in November; and a group show which will see me finally complete the pentaptych sequence, next year (which we hope to tour). I have also built my own website and print shop.