This print was created in conjunction with the Glasgow Print Studio 50th Anniversary Here & Now Legacy Project. During the severe lockdown in March 2020, Taylor and Shapeero began a postal collaboration which would become a significant and formative part of their practice. Not being able to meet physically, or indeed leave their Glasgow flats, they sent bundles of A4 drawings to one another by post. They would both begin a series of informal and often messy drawings and would send them away unfinished.

The arrival of the Manila envelope was a special treat during that time. It contained a physical connection to another person when almost all social connections were through a screen. The drawings contained the energy of that person - their direct creativity.

The pair worked on top of one another’s drawings, they made gestures that swerved around, mirrored or obscured – dancing around one another’s movements. They overcame the fear of ruining the drawings and discovered a ‘looseness’ by making large volumes of drawings; none too precious, risks allowed. Many of the drawings were stopped at being simply two gestures, two-steps, when one of the artists decides a drawing is finished - that’s it.

Following on from deep lockdown the pair would meet periodically and continued to exchange their bundles. They work on them in moments alone, between bits of tidying and laptop-based commitments. These have become moments of pleasure for both artists, a small and gratifying retreat. They continue to exchange the drawings – still titled ‘Lockdown Drawings’ and the last was counted No. 370.

This silkscreened varied edition of mono-prints is based on Lockdown Drawing No. 169.

Beth Shapeero and Fraser Taylor have been painting, drawing and printmaking together since 2018 as part of their collaborative project Two-Step.

Both living and working in Glasgow, they were drawn to one another’s work after noticing a distinctly shared aesthetic and process.

Beth is an emerging artist from Nottingham who has lived and worked in Glasgow since 2011. Beth graduated her BA in Fine Art (Hons) at Nottingham Trent University in 2008 before relocating to Glasgow for the M.Litt in Fine Art Practice in 2011.

Fraser, originally from Glasgow, is an established artist and has spent a significant part of his career working in Chicago where he was a faculty member at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Fraser graduated from GSA in 1981 with a BA in Printed Textiles and an MA in 1983 from the Royal College of Art in London. He returned to live and work in Glasgow in 2017.

Exhibitions include Govan Project Space, Glasgow (2019), The Beacon Arts Centre, Greenock (2020) and The Royal Scottish Academy (2021). They are currently working on a project for Platform in Easterhouse, Glasgow in 2023.