THE WELLSPRING

A poem about a boat wreck

This boat sits on the bank of the river Dee in Kirkcudbright just a short distance from my house. It's a familiar sight to many in Kirkcudbright and I pass it often when walking our dog. I have watched its slow demise over many years. Once a substantial vessel the Wellspring is now abandoned and exposed.



To begin with I wanted to capture the essence of the boat's name plate in a letterpress print so I found a vintage tuscan style font in a similar style. The font I used was a 96pt Delittle (No.116) wooden font called "Condensing". On the name plate "WELLSPRING" has a slight curve to the text so I had to fashion some custom curved wooden furniture to lock it into the printing press.



The text was then hand inked and printed on a vintage Albion iron hand press. I used white ink on Rembrant Denim paper, this is a high quality absorbant paper and it represented the original colour of the boat well. I also wanted to print the decorative curls that appear below the boat's name.



To create the decorative element I carved a simple linocut and taped it to an MDF block to bring it up to type height. I added this to the print using the Albion hand press.



Althought I used the Albion press for the title I switched to a proofing press for the body text as it was easier to get some alignment. I wrote the poem to summarise how I feel when I see her there. I have some affinity with the vulnerability of the boat. Once capable of great things she's now slowly decaying. There is an inevitable end to the boat either through removal or being slowly worn away and washed out to sea. There is a sadness but also a beauty in this, a reminder that we all have a finite time and need to live and enjoy our days of buoyancy.



I'm quite pleased with how this print turned out and I have made a limited edition print run of just 20 which are being sold in aid of Kirkcudbright Lifeboat Station at this year's Art and Crafts Trail. The full poem is below;