IMPACT stands for ‘International Multi-disciplinary Printmaking, Artists, Concepts and Techniques’. The idea for the first IMPACT conference was developed by Richard Anderton and Professor Stephen Hoskins based on their joint visits to the American Southern Graphics Council conferences in the early 90’s. They realised there was no international forum specifically for printmakers and created IMPACT – initially based on the Southern Graphics concept but the increasing thrust of IMPACT has been to create an academic forum whilst maintaining a showcase for print practitioners.
Over the past two decades IMPACT has evolved as Europe’s leading academic discourse on printmaking. Printmaking is now integral to the wider academic debate, through practice, theory, visual culture, and is studied across a range of programmes, from undergraduate to PhD around the world.
We are delighted to announce that The Centre for Fine Print Research will be hosting IMPACT 12 multidisciplinary printmaking conference, The Printmakers’ Voice, 19th-25th September 2022.
This is next year!
We appreciate that, in less than 17 months, in 2022, the pandemic may still have a firm grip on some countries, and many will be coping with the after-effects. Building on the success of the Hong Kong team, will be hosting both online and in person, encouraging and widening participation, and focusing on listening to each other’s voices.
We propose this event and conference to have a therapeutic function. We want to share and engage international participants from all backgrounds, and connect people through presentations and films, workshops and exhibitions, challenges, round-table discussion groups and networking. The networking and the participant conversations will be key to this conference: we want to hear from all of you!
- To this end, we will begin with a summer programme of celebrating prints and books, which will start in July 2022 and continue throughout the conference.
- We will shortly be making a call for studios and workshops to collaborate with us to reflect on your studio activities during lockdown and celebrate and promote your ongoing resilience.
- We will be making a call for students worldwide to work with us by establishing and promoting a series of networked activities and challenges, reaching out to far-flung communities.
- We will be making a call for print ambassadors, working with the IMPACT team, refining and envisioning our print themes and creating a worldwide conference.
- Last but not least, we will be calling for print enthusiasts and print scholars to submit papers, exhibitions and demonstrations for consideration to the conference. We are proposing themes around:
- Post-pandemic Voice
- Touching and Touched
- Printability and transmutability
- The Printmakers’ Garden
- Breaking Boundaries
- Merging and Metamorphosis
Past IMPACT Conferences:
2021 IMPACT 11 Hosted by Hong Kong Open Printshop
https://www.impact11.hk/
2018 IMPACT 10 Hosted by SM Pro Art, Santander, Spain
https://www.impact10.es/
2015 IMPACT 9 Hosted by the China Academy of Art, Hangzhou, China.
2013 IMPACT 8 Hosted by Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art and Design, University of Dundee.
IMPACT 8 website
2011 IMPACT 7 Hosted by Monash University, Australia.
impact7.org.au/index.html
2009 IMPACT 6 Hosted at UWE Bristol, England.
2007 IMPACT 5 Hosted by the Estonian Printmakers’ Association and Estonian Academy of Art, held at KUMU, a purpose built art museum in Tallinn.
2005 IMPACT 4 Co-hosted by the Unversität der Künste Berlin and the National Museum in Poznan and coordinated by University of Tennessee.
Conference website
2003 IMPACT 3 Co-hosted by the South Africa Michaelis School of Fine Art, University of Cape Town with Rhodes University School of Fine Art.
2001 IMPACT 2 Hosted by the University of Art and Design Helsinki UIAH, Finland.
Conference website
1999 IMPACT 1 Held at UWE Bristol, England
