Barbara started to make screenprint with Carol Robertson at the Grall Press Studio in Edinburgh in 1995 . Her approach involves painting autographic positives using innovative light-blocking mixtures (tusches) and using my proper painting rather than industrial inks.

“We soon discovered that we shared an inquiring, open and bold approach to printmaking as well as a love of colour, surface qualities and artists materials. I saw that Barbara would require tusches with characteristics and handling qualities which would be sensitive enough to allow her to paint washes, expressive marks and textures, so I set about trying to create a range specially for her needs. This has become an ongoing project and now we have tusches which can be used to create dry brush strokes, wet brush strokes, sugar-lift effects, reticulated washes similar to stone and zinc plate lithographic washes, dotted aquatint-like tones, impressed collage textures as in soft ground etching and tusches which can be applied by roller and allow lines to be drawn in as in monotyping process which Barbara has developed. Barbara often paints as many as sixty individual autographic positives for a single screenprint. These painted marks are then printed in a series of layers, an opaque colour will conceal parts of the previously printed image whereas a translucent layer will interact with the colours and tonality of the image. In this way the screenprint becomes richly complex and Barbara has great control over its progress”. Carol Robertson