Team

LPW Team

Kate Da’Casto
Education Manager
k.dacasto@leicesterprintworkshop.com

Having worked with LPW since 2010 as a volunteer, tutor, fundraiser and Artist in Residence, Kate joined the LPW team in 2016 as a Studio Worker and became Education Programme Manager in 2020, designing courses and bespoke educational offers for a wide variety of groups and individuals.

Graduating from her Fine Art degree at DMU in 2010 with a first, Kate won the Printmakers Council Student Award, the Embrace Arts at the University of Leicester Mentoring Prize and Leicester Print Workshop’s Degree Show Prize. Her art practice spans etching, monoprint, textile art and surface embellishment, photography, assemblage, collage, book making and sculpture.

Obsessed by fragmentary moments, lost objects and the processes of human growth and decay, she has a peculiar amount of Very Strange Things in her home studio and will always be loyal to following her weirdness.

Katy Goodrich
Studio Technician
katy.goodrich@leicesterprintworkshop.com

A part of the studio team, Katy has been involved with the studio for the last 15 years. Starting as a volunteer, she then undertook a 5 year apprenticeship at LPW learning all aspects of print. Katy's our screenprinting whizz and became a technician in 2020. Katy also teaches on the course programme, in schools and with community groups.

Sarah Kirby
Cleaner

Sarah ’s introduction to Printmaking and Print Workshops was with Walter Hoyle at Cambridge College of Arts. She then did a degree in Fine Art at West Surrey College of Art and Design, followed by an MA in Museum and Gallery Studies. A few years after working in Local authority Museums she did an MA in Fine art at Nottingham Trent University which led swiftly to taking up the job of PrintWorker/Manager at Leicester Print Workshop from 1993 - 98.Since then Sarah has been employed as technician, framer, gardener and freelance tutor and now works as the organisation’s cleaner.

Kezia Kneller
Operations Manager
k.kneller@leicesterprintworkshop.com

Robyn Maclennan
Studio Technician
robyn.maclennan@leicesterprintworkshop.com

Robyn joined Leicester Print Workshop as part of the technician team at the end of 2021, specialising in etching and photographic techniques. She uses multiple printmaking and photography processes to explore the landscape and our connections to it. Robyn holds an MA in Fine Art and is currently undertaking a PhD at London College of Communication where she is researching how ecoGothic theory can be used to re-examine our relationship with nature and how fear has permeated our perceptions of the non-human world. She is particularly interested in the links between the darkness found in the ecoGothic and the necessity of darkness to her photography and printmaking practice as well as how understanding the agency of both the natural world and the works she produces can grant us a better understanding of the world around us.

Serena Smith
Studio Technician
s.smith@leicesterprintworkshop.com

As part of the studio team, Serena Smith supports the creative journeys of our members and wider community. In partnership with the workshop she established the Lithography Fellowship programme, and continues to oversee the development of Leicester Print Workshop as a well-supported facility for artists to learn this artisan practice. Internationally recognised in the field of fine art lithography, alongside her own studio practice, writing and research, she continues to teach workshops, and offer bespoke tuition and technical support in lithography. Information about her projects and activities can be found on her website: serenasmith.org

LPW Board of Trustees

Tonia Lu, Interim Chair

I am a curator and experienced mentor and advisor for artists. My history with Leicester began when I studied for my MA in Museum Studies at University of Leicester, and my experience since then spans geographically from Aberdeenshire to Cornwall, as well as across the broadest spectrum of visual art & craft – from running the inaugural Environmental Art Festival in Scotland, to working with design-led businesses in Cornwall.

In the last 7 years I have worked as a visual art and craft specialist mentor and advisor on public-funded programmes supporting over 200 organisations, businesses and individuals in Cornwall, in aspects of planning, marketing, finance and income generation. And in 2023, I set up and produced Cornwall’s newest visual art festival Flamm, providing more opportunities for artists as well as benefiting deprived communities in Cornwall. I’m currently Director of Creative Enterprise at Creative Kernow – also an Arts Council England National Portfolio Organisation, like LPW.

My passion lies in the role of creativity and arts in community and social change, with a special interest in decentralisation, I gained my PhD in Cultural Policy from University of Glasgow for my research on this subject. I joined the Leicester Print Workshop board of trustees in 2020 after I founded House of Prints – an online platform for contemporary printmaking. I find printmaking the perfect mix of craftsmanship, provocation and beauty and appreciates it as a long-standing way of democratising art and making voices heard. I believe my understanding of printmaking, the contemporary visual art world, as well as my experience of supporting artists could support LPW team and members build a great future of strong programme and balanced business model.

Jonathan Archard

I started my career at NatWest working there for 23 years ending my time as a Business Manager with a portfolio of businesses. After that I worked as a course team leader in management at South Nottingham College for 10 years supplying training to various organisations such as the Queens Medical Centre in Nottingham, the local NHS trusts and Boots PLC. Subsequently I was involved in enterprise and business support initially as part of an initiative in the local deprived areas of Nottingham and subsequently specialising in the creative sector. I was employed by Tribal PLC in a range of roles as a business adviser, trainer and organisational consultant and was part of an ACE funded project working with arts organisations across Derbyshire. I have also worked for NBV Enterprise Solutions Ltd and on a freelance basis.

Following my retirement and move to Leicester some 8 years ago I joined LPW as a novice printmaker having always had an interest in art and with a long-cherished desire to create my own work. The team here has helped me to develop as a printmaker to the point where I have sold a number of my own prints. As a result of my concern about the future of the workshop I rejoined the board some 6 months ago. I believe passionately in the organisation and its pursuit of both inclusivity and excellence.

Jennifer Dranttel

Jennifer Dranttel has a BArch from the University of Colorado (2002), an MFA in Fibers from Savannah College of Art & Design (2017), and spent over a decade as a professionally-exhibiting fine artist. She has shown a couture fashion collection at New York and Paris Fashion Weeks, and participated in artist residencies and exhibitions all over the world- including most notably the International Print Triennial (Finland, 2022), The International Original Print Exhibition (London, 2021), and the USA National Printmaking Exhibition (2015) and the Diplomacy by Design showcase at the US White House (2016). She is in her final year of a fully-funded PhD at De Montfort University titled “Biomimicry-inspired Material Innovation in Mongolian Gers to Combat Negative Indoor Air Quality”, inspired by two years teaching Art and Design at the British School of Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. Her research is focused on developing biomaterial innovations and open-source teaching materials to encourage scalable citizen-led design based solutions to tackle the issues of air pollution, waste mismanagement, and cultural flux facing Ulaanbaatar. Jennifer works within the realms of Speculative Design and future-thinking across Design Theory, Textiles, Biomaterials, Education for Sustainable Development, and Architecture. She has presented her research in a TedX Talk (2022), The UK Conference on Circular Wool (2022), Conference on Living Textile Architectures (2022), and in Dubai at COP28 (2023). She is a member of the Textile Engineering and Material Research Group (De Montfort University) and the BioFutures for Transplanetary Habitats Research Group (Newcastle University), and is currently the BA (Hons) Textile Design Programme Leader at Loughborough University. She joined LPW as a member in 2020, though in 2024 has not renewed membership due to hectic working hours and screenprinting access at the “day job.”

Kate Hodges

After graduating from a fashion and textile design degree at Leicester Polytechnic Kate, was a joint founder and director of a knitwear design and supply company in the city. Since leaving the company and developing her art practice she has also worked as an administrator for the Friends of the University of Leicester botanic garden, ran session work in Leicester City Council Neighbourhood centres and the adult education centre in gardening and textile skills, and had the privilege of being a befriending co-ordinator for a charity supporting young autistic adults. In 2007 Kate joined the Friends of the University of Leicester Botanic Garden committee eventually serving as Chair 2014-17. Kates been a member of Leicester print workshop since May 2017 where she has developed her practice in printmaking, particularly photolithography

Jean McMeakin

I have held both operational and strategic roles in a number of large and small organisations in the commercial and not-for-profit sectors. Before my last full-time role on a Divisional Board in the BBC, I worked in many areas of the BBC, including Global News and Television Production. As well as general management, I have specialisms in HR and talent development, performance management, OD, and have delivered large scale business restructuring programmes with productivity improvements and significant cost savings. Previously I have worked for a children’s charity, in the film industry, and in the insurance, petrochemical, and manufacturing sectors.

I am a Non-Executive Director and Chair of the De Morgan Foundation Trustee Board, and a Trustee of Bankside Open Spaces Trust. I sit on the British Museum Friends Advisory Council, and I also sit on Dulwich Picture Gallery Friends Advisory Panel. In the past I have been a School Governor for the City of Westminster and I am a former Trustee of the Friends of Putney School of Art & Design.

As well as my interests in the arts generally I am an amateur etcher, and attend Putney Art School in London, where I live, to study etching in all its forms. LPW was already known to me as an expert in the field, not least from the useful practise guides it offers. I am interested in the great work that LPW does and I am hoping to bring my professional and my charity board experience to support LPW in delivering its ambitions and ensuring it has a sustainable future.