Keng Keng Watt: Print Clan Artist in Residence 2024
The second artist in our 2024 residency programme, Keng Keng Watt, documents her month in the Print Clan studio creating eco & screen printed panels of second hand fabric centred on personal memories of belonging.
Keng Keng is an arts activist, experimental milliner, and textile artist. Originally from Southwest China, she is now based in Glasgow. Over the past five years she has developed a strong interest in screen-printing, natural dyes, and eco-printing through working with a wide range of groups - including environmental and racial-justice activists, youth groups, and artistic communities.
“I regularly run classes and workshops focussed on helping marginalised or vulnerable groups develop tools to express themselves through specific artistic techniques, based on both community bonding and anti-racist messaging through textiles.”
Recently, my artistic and activist practices have centred on communal sharing of personal memories and collective resting, using textile techniques as a medium of connection and as part of my residency at Print Clan, I created a screen-printed quilt, based on personal themes and memories of home and belonging home, safety, and belonging, all related to notions of rest. I used a variety of methods including traditional quilting practices embellished with experimental textile techniques.
I explored how botanical materials can be used to create effective screen-printing inks and plant-based binders, especially with plants which hold emotional resonance for me personally. I also learned CMYK screen-printing techniques and produced a series of screen-printed panels with images, fragments of text, and specific patterns recollected from my childhood. I used Print Clan’s bullet-steamer to create a large eco-print back panel for the quilt based on foraged botanical materials.
Towards the end of my residency I ran an eco-printing and natural dye screen-printing workshop with Standing Tall community group. The workshop began with a short summary of my project at Print Clan, after which I discussed different methods of eco-printing and natural dyeing, including how to use botanical materials to print and create patterns on fabric.
Each participant learned to eco-print personalised t-shirts using foraged botanical materials. And collectively we rolled all the t-shirts up and put them in the bullet steamer. Participants also printed with template screens on found fabrics to create small images, then had the opportunity to alter these prints with collage techniques to create patches they were able to take home with them - small personalised mementos of the workshop.
“My residency at Print Clan was such a genuinely fulfilling experience. I have been a member of Print Clan for over 3 years now - I generally use the screen printing facilities for community or activist projects. However, the residency was such a valuable opportunity to be able to use the studio and facilities to focus on my own art practice, something I had been longing for but unable to do because of lack of time and finances.”
It proved to me the importance of focusing on one’s own work in order to be a more supportive member of the artistic community - I will be sure to carve out regular time and space for my own creative outputs.