Congratulations Ruth Helmling, Gary Tricker Scholarship recipient 2026
PCANZ is thrilled to award the Gary Tricker Summer School 2026 Scholarship to Ruth Helmling.
The award is valued at $800 and includes attendance at the 2026 Summer School and membership of PCANZ for 2026. Ruth has chosen to attend a 4-day workshop - Nan Mulder - Masterclass in Mezzotin at Rangi Ruru School for Girls in Christchurch from 12th - 16th January.
Welcome Ruth!
After a tricky start with canceled flights due to high winds. It was great to see you at Summer School.
Ruth Hemling
Ninja’s (Ruth) Summer School Report
Summary Summer School 2026
I had been particularly looking forward to this year’s summer school: I’d managed to put my name down for the mezzotint masterclass. The illustrious printmaking process of times long gone, and something of a mystery to me. All I had gotten out of our experienced local printmakers were infos such as: It’ll wreck wrists – you’ll spend lots of time rocking – and the velvety blacks were what makes it all worth while, if you were prepared for the sacrifice. It sounded like a secretive world only few were granted access. I was keen to find out if I could wriggle my way in. And thanks to PCANZ and Gary Tricker, I would be able to join, all the way from Gisborne. The South Island can be quite far away if you live out East in the North.
Very far indeed, we found out at Wellington airport the day before summer school. My fellow Gizzy printmakers, Paula and Torri, and I learned how time can expand to the max and how to slow our own excited pace down to a minimum, waiting and doing more waiting for delayed and cancelled flights, as we happened upon one out of six extra windy Wellington days. We became quite familiar with the luggage carousel, repeatedly picking up our bags and checking them in for the next scheduled time we briefly pinned our hopes on. Until it was no more, and we knew for sure: We were stuck in Wellington. We would be missing out on day one of summer school!
In hindsight, it felt a bit like a first lesson in Mezzotint. Mezzotint oozes history and patience. It dates back to a time where images were few to be had and those visually inclined relied mainly on hours of observation. By the time I arrive to class one day late, my mind and body are adjusted to a pace suitable to the technique developed almost five centuries ago. I have slowed down sufficiently to focus on working on my rite of passage. As to how - this will be up to master mezzotinter Nan Mulder to teach us. In only four days (three for us latecomers) we hope to squeeze enough knowledge out of Nan’s decades of experience to be able to venture out on our own afterwards. We are learning from one of the best: Nan Mulder, originally from the Netherlands, has studied and printed all around the globe.
And then we are holding the famous rocker in our hand and are trying the first moves of the wrist-wrecking practice. Surprisingly, I quite enjoy it. After all the excitement and agony with our cancelled flights, the repetitive movement is almost meditative. The rocking tally in my journal accumulates – and eventually Nan gives me the thumbs up: I have rocked my first plate!
With the first step done, I am now ready to work the light into the velvety blacks I just created. I prop up my screen in expectation: It is meant to diffuse the light, because otherwise the copper plate looks just like that, a shiny copper coloured plate. Behind the screen, one can make out the image one is trying to peel out of the plate. This is done with a scraper, in gentle, microscopic moves. It takes a lot longer than the rocking, and only on day three I have done enough scraping to even do my first proof. A lot more variables influence the quality of the image – the type of ink, the paper, how one dabs and wipes. And even then it’ll probably be way too dark still, as Nan predicts, because scraping takes a lot longer even than the a lot longer you expect it to take.
It is quite fascinating to see all those images popping out of the plates that were blank just one or two days earlier. Teacups so realistic you might pick them up for a refill at the morning tea station. I am working on wave breaking in front of distant icebergs. A rather complicated image, I come to understand during hours and hours of microscopic scraping, and I am glad Nan discouraged me from trying the image she deemed complicated. But gradually, the proofs become lighter and loose a bit of their ‘gothic’ touch. In the end, we are all quite proud of what we have achieved in so short a time. We could never have done so with the expert guiding hand and eye of our fabulous tutor! Nan Mulder has been absolutely fantastic. And, in that spirit, us new founded Nan-Fans are determined to carry on and bring a bit of darkness and light to this printmaking process of the old.
About the Gary Tricker Summer School Scholarship fund:
PCANZ is excited a new fund was been created in 2023 to support the Summer School Scholarship, now named the Gary Tricker Summer School Scholarship.
The Gary Tricker Summer School Scholarship fund has been created thanks to the Gary Tricker deceased estate through the sale of his studio items.
PCANZ is hugely grateful to the family and the estate, and to those who worked tirelessly towards setting up of the fund. It was a massive undertaking by the PCANZ team - Lynne and Alan Wilburn, Rosalie and Jack Thompson, Kathy Boyle and Heather Partel. Huge thanks to all who made this possible.
Gary Tricker was an Honorary member of PCANZ. You can find out more about him in the Stuff obituary here and p38 in PROOF, the PCANZ 2023 publication.