Monday, December 1, 2014

Success with plastic plate lithography



I ruined a few aluminum lithograph plates this weekend, but luckily had bought a bunch of plastic plates from Graphic Chemical when we were there three weeks ago. I had mixed results with plastic plates last summer, but they worked well yesterday. This plate has two drawings from the Religious Subversives series.

Saturday, July 5, 2014

American Insects finished



Here is the finished etching, with aquatint, of the "potatoes were the waiters" page, with digital text added. Classmate Laurie Hunt suggested the fade-out of repetitive lines. The possibility of hand-coloring the etchings was also suggested. I finished all three books: The Fly, The Potatoes' Dance, and Depressed by a Book of Bad Poetry, I Walk Toward an Unused Pasture and Invite the Insects To Join Me. The last page of the latter is shown below:













 
It's a lot of scanning to add all the pages of each book but I'd like to make Picasa albums of them in the future. I made slipcases for each set of books, (edition of three) the spine label for the slipcase looks like this:

The three small etchings on the label are repeated on the title page of each book.

Monday, March 10, 2014

Progress on "The Potatoes' Dance"



These are proof etchings for the book The Potatoes' Dance, illustrating the poem by Vachel Lindsay. Aquatint and etched lettering will be added; the lettering here is just written on with pencil. It will be series of ten etchings, bound in a long strip, accordian-style.

I received a very kind letter from Nicholas Lindsay, giving me permission to use his father's poem.

Friday, January 3, 2014

Bridges of Plainwell in Color Etchings



This is my second attempt at a four-color etching; CMYK aquatints and some line work, mostly in black. It's the  M-89 bridge over the millrace, east side of town, with the old paper factory in the background. This is a scan, it's a little fuzzy. My plan is to do all seven bridges of Plainwell in color etchings, and bind them together. I'll be working on these through next semester, along with my "American Insects" series.