The School of the Crawling Claw is a new project from Mutton Fist Press. This initiative centres on a technically ambitious, collaboratively produced print that explores the psychosocial aspects of horror within working-class culture. Created by members of our collective, the work will reflect shared experiences of precarity, defiance, and dark humour—using printmaking as both a narrative tool and political act.
We plan to develop the print by working collaboratively within our group, and with print studios like Edinburgh Print Studio and The Art House, Wakefield. We will use this new network and their professional facilities to build on and expand our technical skills and understanding. The completed piece will be exhibited in Darlington, accompanied by a series of accessible workshops designed to share the processes, skills, and ideas that shaped the work. These workshops will prioritise inclusion, offering creative access to those often excluded from formal art spaces.
Alongside the exhibition, we will also host a public symposium in Darlington, bringing together individual printmakers and independent studios from across the North of England. The symposium will look at access—particularly for disabled and working-class artists—within the printmaking world. Through talks, skill-sharing, and open discussion, we aim to build stronger networks, and imagine more inclusive models of making and organising.
This project builds on an Arts Council England-funded research and development phase, which supports our field visits to established print studios in Scotland and the North. Our aim is to decentralise our professional networks—shifting focus away from London and toward regional solidarity and collaboration.
An award from the Dover Prize would allow us to take this work beyond internal development and into the public realm—consolidating the ethos of Mutton Fist Press and the Crawling Claw as an evolving, community-rooted platform for radical printmaking and shared learning.
The School of the Crawling Claw will bring nationally connected, politically engaged, and technically ambitious printmaking activity to Darlington—offering a rare platform for working-class and disabled artists to exhibit, collaborate, and lead. By hosting a public exhibition, accessible workshops, and a regional symposium in the town, the project will position Darlington as a hub for critical, inclusive print practice. Crucially, the legacy of the project lies in sharing practical skills and knowledge—empowering participants to not only make work, but to set up their own DIY print spaces and collectives. By demystifying print processes and studio models, we aim to leave behind a self-sustaining culture of making, teaching, and organising—placing Darlington at the heart of a growing, regional network of accessible printmaking.
The three artists making this proposal are Gareth Berwyn, Lisa Cradduck and Phill Wilson Perkin. Individually we have fine art practices, with Phill specialising in interdisciplinary projects combining sound art, performance art and sculpture. Phill regularly shows at Gallery 46, London. Gareth and Lisa both work predominantly in print and recently in ceramic sculpture, curating and exhibiting in a group ceramics show ‘Reclamation of the Mud Touchers’ in October 2024.
Collectively we have extensive experience of curating exhibitions and hosting events as Mutton Fist Press and Five Years. We’ve run artist talks, performances and workshops, a lock-down, mail-art print project called ‘Broadsided’(2020), ‘5yrsly’ a film and lecture programme, and the ‘Archway Sound Symposium’ a three day multi- venue sound art event. In 2022 MFP ran a year-long residency for artist and fashion designer David Holah, which culminated in an exhibition, performance, and a drag print workshop open to the public. In 2022 and 2023 we collaborated with The Bomb Factory Art Organisation to run pop-up print shops in Camden High Street and Covent Garden, showcasing our member’s print and performance work, and including a public lecture on Revolutionary Mexican Printmaking by Leonardo Zumaya, a visiting Mexican art historian.
Phill holds a BA (Hons) in Sculpture from Coventry University and an MA in Fine Art from Chelsea College of Art and Design. Lisa earned a BA (Hons) in Combined and Media Arts from Sheffield Hallam University, followed by a Postgraduate Diploma from Chelsea College of Art and Design. Gareth holds a BA (Hons) from London Guildhall.
Mutton Fist received an Arts Council Project Grant in 2025, a Skinners Charity Grant in 2024, another Arts Council Project Grant in 2023, and a Project Grant for resident artist Mary Yacoob in 2022. Phill was awarded the Arts Council’s Artists International Development Fund in 2012. Lisa received an Elephant Trust Grant in 2024 and an Eaton Trust Fund grant in 2025. Gareth has been shortlisted for the Eirian Llwyd Memorial Award 2025
Mutton Fist Press (MFP) is a disability-led print studio and arts organisation working primarily with disabled artists and communities from lower socioeconomic backgrounds. Our aim is to become a fully established, professional space offering accessible art education, affordable studio access, shared equipment, and a supportive, inclusive community.
Based in Islington, MFP connects overlapping local networks—linking artists, community groups, and residents through the shared use of printmaking tools and techniques. We facilitate creative exchange between amateur and professional artists, providing a space where neurodiverse and marginalised individuals can experiment, learn, and thrive outside of traditional, often exclusionary, art institutions.
Crawling Claw, the exhibition arm of MFP, has no fixed space and exists to showcase the work of working-class and marginalised artists in public, unconventional settings.
MFP also leads activity at Five Years Gallery, an unfunded, artist-run project space founded in 1998. The gallery maintains a strong link between making and exhibiting work, hosting shows and educational events both at its North London site and in local venues like Archway Library.
Phill was commissioned by the ICA and the K11 Art Foundation to create a response to Zhang Ding’s Enter the Dragon installation, 2015
Phill participated in the Corbin Union residency in 2012 and completed a residency at Hospitalfield in 2015. Lisa undertook a printmaking residency at Hospitalfield in Arbroath, Scotland in 2014, followed by a large format etching residency at the Venice Printmaking Studio in Murano, Italy later that same year.
Email: lisacradduck@googlemail.com
Address: 146 Tufnell Park Road, Islington, London, London, N7 0DZ, GB
Local Authority: Islington
