Dr Paul Laidler

Qualifications:

BA, MA, PhD

Position:

Senior Lecturer in BA Illustration

Department:

Faculty of Arts, Creative Industries, and Education (ACE)

Telephone:

+441173284988

Email:

Paul.Laidler@uwe.ac.uk

Social media:

About me

Paul Laidler is a Senior Lecturer in BA Illustration at UWE Bristol. His work is grounded in expanded graphic practice and operates on the borderlines of illustration and printmaking. He is interested less in illustration as depiction than in narrative embedded within process, material, and mediation. From printmaking, he remains drawn to repeatable form, creativity within constraint, and the subtle shifts that emerge through iteration. His research explores machines as both narrators and influences: in the stories they tell us about ourselves, and in how they shape the stories we tell ourselves. This is reflected in his current research investment scheme project, To Live Is to Be Haunted, after Philip K. Dick, which brings together long-standing interests in mediation, repetition, and technological authorship through an exploration of generative AI and image-making.

His work began with doctoral research investigating the Master Printer’s role in the digital age, establishing a foundation for exploring how technological processes shape artistic production and authorship.

Building on his doctoral research into collaborative and mediated creative processes, he co-established CFPR Editions, a fine art print publishing studio within UWE that serves as both a research platform and practical laboratory for investigating technological mediation in artistic production. The studio's emphasis on collaborative dialogue between artists, printers, and digital tools has provided crucial insights into how creative agency operates in technologically-mediated environments. This research focus naturally led to securing two REACT (Research & Enterprise in Arts & Creative Technologies) grants, which explored how app technologies could extend collaborative possibilities in printed matter, further examining the intersection of digital and physical creation.

A consistent thread throughout his practice has been the investigation of remakes and derivatives as transformative acts, from printmaking's historical relationship with reproduction to contemporary questions of AI-generated imagery. This investigation has evolved through several significant projects, beginning with "Just Press Print," an international touring exhibition that revealed the often-hidden dialogues between artists and technology. This research expanded into "Looking Through the Eyes of Machines," an international print exchange project examining post-digital responses in graphic arts practice. This initiative, connecting institutions across the UK, USA, and Spain, explored how emerging practitioners navigate the technological mediation of creative practice, particularly investigating what Bruce Sterling describes as the "raw graphic novelty" generated by our contemporary technological landscape.

As an Associate Editor of Intellects Drawing Research Theory Practice journal and through his role as external examiner for programs including Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts, Singapore, he contributes to shaping international discourse around practice-based research in art and design. His work appears in major collections including the V&A and Tate Britain, and he has undertaken significant residencies at institutions including The University of Texas at Austin and The Eugeniusz Geppert Academy Wroclaw Poland.

Area of expertise

Paul’s research is primarily concerned with the impact of digital technologies upon the rol​​e of artist, designer and maker in post digital practices. His approach to research draws upon practice related inquiries that are fostered through studio based productions. His area of expertise is rooted in the collaborative print studio model and the realisation of digitally mediated prints for artists. By investigating and documenting the holistic nature of creating printed artifacts within a fine art context Paul's PhD explored the role of the Master Printer in the digital age. Therefore the research examined whether, through the increased democratisation of technology, the role is still significant. It also studied how the Master Printer may mediate the work and whether this is still acceptable or necessary.

Publications

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