Saturday 23 July 2016

July 22, 2016

For basic line etching and aquatint, covered by the first half of the class, go to this link.





Second Part of New Ground Etching Class
(July 19 - 22)


My piece in green and brown,
achieved with "selective wiping"


After teaching us basic etching and aquatinting, Regina Held taught us various other etching techniques in the New Grounds class:


SOFT GROUND

One can apply a coat of soft ground
as the resist,
and press thin material onto the plate
to create textures,
after running it all through the press




Spread ink out with brayer


Having laid thin grassy material over the inked plate,
and covering it all with parchment paper (or wax paper),
they ran it all through the press


Etch plate before taking off ground


Kim's print



SOFT GROUND VARIATION
 crayon manner


Crayon manner --
drawing into soft ground


Ink up plate as above,


Place paper on top of inked plate


Draw on top of paper 
(to pull ink off plate)


Some of the drawn lines worked better than others --
perhaps a ball point pen or pointy pencil work best.
Also, drawing directly onto the plate with 
a hard pointed pencil worked too
(see bottom wavy lines)


An example of a 
good Crayon Manner print




SPITBITE

Applying the acid directly to the copper plate
(ferric chloride) with a brush,
and letting sit for the same time 
one would leave the plate in an acid bath


John's spitbite print.
This method gives softer edges,
and thus more painterly darks


LIFT GROUND

Pool soda ash solution
on a plate coated with Pledge Floor Wax hard ground,
so that the soda ash selectively compromises the hard ground,
and then etch in ferric chloride.


Applying soda ash with a brush
onto a copper plate coated with hard ground

I failed the class, by cleaning my plate before etching it.  Therefore we have no lift ground print to show.


CRISCO LIFT

 Liquefy some Crisco oil
in a microwave,
and brush it onto the copper plate


Brushing on Crisco before it solidifies.
The apply ground, let dry:
then rub ground off with sponge, 
before etching.


Crisco lift gives a more painterly print



SELECTIVE WIPING


Apply more than one color onto the same plate,
and wiping them off carefully,
to make multi-colored prints
with only one roll through the press


Green and brown ink
(don't use black)


Burnishing the white, non-inked, areas,
so that they will be easier to wipe


After inking the whole plate with brown ink,
and wiping it off with a tarlatan,
Kim selectively applies the green ink
in particular sections of her print


Now she has to wipe off the green ink
carefully


Two colored selective wiping print



CHINE COLLE


With the Chine Colle method, one glues a piece of decorative paper onto the printmaking paper, with a press.  Wheat paste glues the pieces of paper together.  The copper plate prints on the decorative paper.


Cut the decorative paper to the size of the plate,
and spritz the back with water.


Presses the excess water out by hand


Dusts the decorative paper with wheat paste,
using a sugar shaker


Placing the decorative paper onto the inked plate,
with the wheat paste side up.


Place the print making paper over 
the plate and decorative paper,
and run through the press


Chine colle print


Put newsprint over the print,
and an acrylic plate over both,
while the chine colle print dries.
Change newsprint often,
even a couple of times in the first hour.

Because the printmaking paper and decorative paper are made of two different materials, they dry at different rates.  This means that Chine colle prints tend to curl, even after they've been thoroughly dried.




CURATING




There are very big differences between the kinds of prints:

  • Print -- a limited edition print, where all prints are alike.  The plate contains "permanent information" (such as an etch).
  • Monoprint -- where the plate contains "permanent information," but the plate is printed such that there exists only one of this kind of variation
  • Monotype -- where the plate is blank, one inks it up like making a painting, and only one of these prints exists in the end.



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