Belinda Del Pesco Fine Art Blog

Monotype: Gun Slinger Rosie

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Del Pesco) — Wed, 27 Jul 2011 18:47:00 +0000

Gun Slinger Rosie 6.5 x 4.25 Dark Field Monotype Ghost with watercolor
Available on Etsy.
This is a ghost print from a monotype I did awhile ago. I painted it this week in between some commission work. The reference image is one of hundreds of tiny black and white vintage photos snapped with a brownie camera by my grandparents when they were raising four kids in rural Connecticut in the 40's & 50's. The photos are carefully attached to black paper pages with glued corner mounts in a scuffed & fragile blue photo album everyone in my family loves to look through. There are some conspicuously empty corner mounts as a result of family pilfering, so my grandmother guards the album with an arched eyebrow. A few years ago, I sat in one of her barcaloungers, and took pictures of their pictures - one by one - with my digital camera set on micro for close up shots. The results aren't bad, and in most of them, I have enough information to 1) enjoy recognizable photos of people I love, and 2) paint and draw from the images. The photo used here (I enlarged it in photoshop and printed it below) was from a group shot of my mother and her siblings playing cowboys and indians in full regalia.

The reference photo and the ghost print - side by side. I'm starting to add watercolor here, and I eventually added a sheriff's badge, because my mother has always liked to be in charge. :)

Monotypes & Ghost prints: the zinc plate is at the top center of the photo above. That plate is coated with black ink, and the image is lifted out of the ink in a subtractive process of wiping with points, pastel stomps and q-tips, and tapping with a paper-towel covered finger tips. Starting with a pigment covered plate and lifting the image out of the ink is called a Dark Field Monotype. A sheet of paper is laid on the still-wet, manipulated ink on the plate, and it goes through a press where the pressure squeezes the ink against the paper. When you pull the paper from the plate, you get a monotype - which in this case - is directly below the zinc plate. As there is usually more ink left on the plate, you can run another sheet of paper against the plate through the press and get a fainter version of the monotype, which is called a ghost print. In this monotype, I was heavy handed on the ink application to the plate, so I was able to get two ghosts; the one on the right first, and the one on the left second. And you can see that there's still a bit of ink left on the plate, but not enough to produce a viable print, so it gets washed and dried, and re-inked to make something else. The ghost print of Gun Slinger Rosie is from this same process, with watercolors added after the ink was dry. There are older posts on this blog about monotypes here, here and here.

Art Quote
Rembrant was widely and deeply appreciated during his life and from an early age. His financial failure came from his own deliberate withdrawal from a brilliant career as a fashionable portrait artist, and from his own spectacular mismanagement of his money. Insofar as the society of seventeenth-century Amsterdam bears any responsibility for the artist's ruin, that responsibility comes not from a failure to appreciate, but from a too facile appreciation. Rembrandt, from the time he was in his mid-twenties, enjoyed the full flavor of fashion and high pay that goes with the job. He happened to be a great artist and passed beyond fashion in his work at about the same time that fashion , inevitably, was turning elsewhere. He lived, however, as if he planned to be fashionable forever. He made imprudent investments, bought a luxurious house which became a huge burden, and poured his money into art collecting. Some years before his death, his financial straits were so desperate he was forced into bankruptcy, he had his goods and chattels sold out from under him, and his entire artistic production was placed in the legal control of his mistress and his son. ~The Complete Etchings of Rembrandt - Frank Getlein

Watercolor: He Hung the Moon for Her (& the DPW Challenge!)

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Del Pesco) — Fri, 29 Jul 2011 16:20:00 +0000

He Hung the Moon for Her 6 x 4.5 graphite and watercolor on Arches paper

This is the Daily Paintworks challenge this coming week: Value Challenge: Black & White to Color (You don't have to be a member to participate, and it's free). For this challenge, use the black and white window photo above by clicking on it, and then drag the full size version to your desktop. (It's grainy, but that's good, because you won't be tempted to focus on details over values.) The challenge is to paint a color version of this image - in any color harmonies you'd like, but keep the values accurate.

For folks new to values, we're referring to the gradation between dark, mid-range, and light shades in a value scale. We've all seen and/or practiced values in black and white drawings and monochrome paintings, but translating value from black and white to full color demands a little practice (and a lot of squinting). Many new painters use color in their work, with not enough attention paid to values. For this exercise, use the black and white photo as a value map, and paint a color version of the same scene, squinting frequently to ensure the darkest areas in your painting match the darkest areas of the photo, and your mid-ranges are in sync with the mid-range values the photo, and your lightest lights are where the same bright spots are in the reference photo.

This value exercise gives you lots of room to play - both with your color choices, and loose & painterly vs tightly rendered representation. When you're almost finished with your painting, snap a photo of your work, and use imaging software to check it in black and white. Compare the monochrome photo of your painting to the reference photo, and this will help you see if your values are accurate. Make adjustments on your painting where necessary, and scan or photograph your finished results to post on the DPW Challenge page. We look forward to seeing the full color posts of your work!

There are some tools to help you see values in your work. You can buy a black & white value scale like this one at Dick Blick. And, years ago, a friend gave me a red acetate val-u viewer (below) made by Murphy Enterprises in Torrance, CA. They don't appear to be in business any more, but you can buy a single sheet of red acetate to make your own, or simply use the sheet by itself as a value lens to check your paintings. I found these tools (and squinting a lot) enormously helpful when I was trying to get my head around values in color.

Starting to add thin glazes of color to test harmonies and plan my darkest darks, painting around my lightest lights. If you're working in acrylics or oil paints, you can create an under painting in just three values - dark, mid-tone and light - using one color in various transparencies, similar to what the incredibly talented Karin Jurick has done here, and then start adding colors making sure to stay within those values.

On a plane, headed back to Los Angeles, sketching the window from my reference photo. The graphite is my under painting & value plan, based on the values in the photograph. The darkest parts are the clay pot cactus on the upper sill, the neck of the whiskey bottle, and the leaves & parts of the flowers in the vase. The mid-range values are around the frame of the window, the lower parts of the glass vases, and through out the lost-edges of the marble pattern on the window glass looking outside. The lightest areas are crescents and slivers of light in the suspended crystal hanging in the window, the stopper in the whisky bottle, the sloped crown of the lower window pane, and dots & dashes of light in the flower petals.

Art Quote
Hue is the name given to a color. Value is how dark or light that color is. They are inherently related, and it is vital to be conscious of both. So, val-hue is the term I have coined to describe these combined qualities simultaneously. Together, value and hue - val-hue - create mood, define form, create illusion of space and indicate the source of light. Values in a painting create a two dimensional pictorial design regardless of subject matter. A strong painting is often an arrangement of a few simple shapes of different values. This arrangement of values, if done right, can attract viewers to a painting from across a gallery. If the values in a painting are correct, the color will most likely work, but color cannot save a painting with incorrect values. Painting is a study in relationships. Comparing each value to the others - considering not just hue, but val-hue - is a must. ~Kevin Machpherson, Landscape Painting Inside & Out

Etching: Pilous

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Del Pesco) — Fri, 12 Aug 2011 20:24:00 +0000

Pilous 5 x 1.75 Soft Ground Intaglio Etching with watercolor
Available on Etsy.
I made the plate for this etching a few years ago in Jim Lorigan's Intaglio Printmaking class at College of the Canyons in Valencia California. I've always wanted to learn about etching, and this process - soft ground - was fascinating to me, because of the light, peppered, pencil-like tone you can get in the line work. I've covered that up here with watercolor, but as it was the first soft ground print I'd ever done, I felt more excited about what I *could* do with future soft ground prints, after a little practice. Access to the acid, ventilation and all the supplies is a bit challenging, but I am currently exploring less toxic methods of achieving the same results, now that I understand the general principles of the process. If I find something that works, I'll be sure to share it on this blog.

This is the plate Pilous was printed from - it was originally a scrap piece of zinc under the metal cutter in the Print lab. I beveled the edges with a rasp, and various files, and polished the surface of the plate with finer and finer sandpaper till I was using a grit paste at the end to make an almost mirror shine. The reasons for this are two-fold: 1) a beveled plate won't cut your paper when it's going through enormous pressure from an etching press (and it leaves a lovely plate impression in the paper), and 2) the surface of both the bevel, and the plate itself should be so smooth that ink doesn't stick to it. There are more details about etching online, and in one of my previous posts, I describe a hard ground etching, if you're curious.

Pilous was sitting in my print bin, so I started painting her with watercolor this week, and finished this morning. She reminds me of some of the beautiful old photos I have of my grandmother in the mid 1920's. *Love them!*

Art Quote

An Architect without a very refined knowledge of drawing, must be classed among the handicraft occupations of stonemason and bricklayer; for architecture is nothing more than drawing or design made manifest in some kind of building materials, added to a practical knowledge of the materials employed.

In the splendid ruins of ancient temples, and the more perfect remains of gothic structure yet existing, there are abundant and intrinsic evidences of the draughtsman and builder being one person. The perfect unity of design and execution which pervades these remains, is alone sufficient to prove it; and it must be regretted, for the sake of architecture, that at the present day the draughtsman and builder are so frequently separate persons, as the odium, should there be cause for any, is too easily shifted from one to another, and the merit, when it exists, is either too much divided to possess any real value, or perhaps absorbed by the one least entitled to it.

Painting is the least generally understood of all the arts and sciences, and the reasons are obvious. The first arises out of the absence of a well regulated instruction in those places where instruction in all liberal knowledge ought to abound; where in every other department of knowledge it is most abundant; and where, if the proper study of painting or designing could be added, some students, by it, might be induced to think, when all other branches of learning, human and divine, had been tried in vain, and thus occupy some of those hours devoted by many to pursuits of a much less meritorious description.

The exquisite charms of poetry and music render them worthy of all the honours they receive in our universities; and were painting as generally understood, it would be equally favoured, for it has also its peculiar uses and charms. Its pleasures are conveyed to the mind through the sight a sense that affords to us the purest and least alloyed of all our enjoyments; and most are aware, that knowledge acquired by vision is more perfect, and more lasting, than any which is acquired by the other senses.
~On the Theory of Painting, Theodore Henry Fielding, 1836

Collagraph: Antebellum

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Del Pesco) — Fri, 19 Aug 2011 01:21:00 +0000

Antebellum 4.25 x 4.75 Glue Collagraph with colored pencil
Available on Etsy.
Process shots start at the bottom. And let-me-tell-you, this is a FUN process. :) May I suggest that you collect the supplies and get started, pronto. :)
This is what the print looked like before I added some colored pencil. There are a variety of things you can do to the print after it's dry - which is why you don't have to be too fussy with the inking. Colored pencil, pastel, acrylic and oil all work wonderfully on top of the print.

After a trip through the press, *or* a good hand-rub on the back of the paper with a spoon or a wood drawer knob, the print is pulled from the plate to reveal this very painterly image. At this point, you can add more ink to the plate and print another one, or wipe the plate clean and add completely different colors to print it again. (Unfortunately, this plate was stolen at an art exhibit. I had it out to discuss the process - I was talking with a client, and when I returned to the counter, it was gone. Grrrr. All I can say to whoever stole it is Karma, people. What goes around, Comes around.)

Here is the plate, inked with brushes in the background, and then rolled with the dark blue on the raised glue linear elements. You can see that my brayer touched the background in some areas. but no matter, because this is a pretty loosey-juicey method with lots of wiggle room for ooopses and darnits.

This plate is so simple, I just love this process. This is a scrap piece of matboard, sealed front and back with Liquitex Gloss Medium and Varnish. The suggested figure in the hat is just drizzled elmer's glue. That's it. (If you have a choice, I'd recommend buying Scotch 3M glue instead because it has a tiny applicator and you can get a bit more control as you're squeezing the glue out onto the board.) The piles of printmaking ink in the background were added to the plate with bristle brushes, and then a darker color was rolled out with a brayer, and carefully laid on just the raised glue areas.

Art Quote
One authentic portrait of Leonardo by his own hand exists in a red chalk drawing at the library at Turin. Dating from the last years of his life, it shows the face of a seer, moulded by incessant thought into firm, strongly marked lines. The eyes lurk deep beneath shaggy brows, the hair and beard are long and straggling - it is the face of a man who has peered into hidden things and who has pondered deeply over what he discerned. The beard is no longer "curled and well kept," in the words of a contemporary document, wherein he is described as "of a fine person, well proportioned, full of grace and of a beautiful aspect, wearing a rose-coloured tunic, short to the knee, although long garments were then in use."

Mr. Berenson has suggested that the youth in armour, who alone among all the figures in Leonardo's Adoration of the Magi in the Louvre turns away from the scene and looks towards the spectator, is a portrait of Leonardo himself.
~The Drawings of Leonardo da Vinci by Charles Lewis Hind (1907)

Watercolor: Ram

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Del Pesco) — Fri, 19 Aug 2011 20:53:00 +0000

Ram, 6.75 x 7 Graphite & Watercolor on paper
Sold
I mentioned in a previous post that I was working on a couple of Big Horn Sheep for a patron who gets to see these guys on her lawn. I've finished the pair, and will be framing them next week. They look like good buds - the sort that hang around, snickering & bumping each other over corny jokes, and wagging their eye brows at pretty sheep on the hill.

Art Quote
Oh, what a pity you are not here; what pleasure it would have given you to see Velazquez, who alone is worth the whole journey. The painters of every school who surround him in the Madrid Museum, and who are very well represented, all seem second rate in comparison to him. He is the painter to beat all painters. He didn't astonish me, he enchanted me. The full-length portrait in the Louvre is not by him, only the authenticity of the Infanta cannot be doubted. There is an enormous picture here, filled with small figures like those in The Cavaliers in the Louvre, but the figures of the women and men in this one are perhaps better, and all of them are perfectly free of retouching. The background - the landscape - is by a pupil of Velazquez.
The most astonishing work in this splendid collection, and perhaps the most astonishing piece of painting that has ever been done, is the one entitled in the catalogue Portrait of a Celebrated Actor in the Time of Philip IV. The background fades into nothing; the old boy all in black, so olive, seems to be surrounded by air. And, ah, The Spinners; and the beautiful portrait of Alonzo Cano; and Las Meninas - another extraordinary picture! The philosophers - what astonishing works! And all the dwarfs too! - one in particular, seated full face with his hands on his hips; a painting for the real connoisseur. And his magnificent portraits! - one would have to include the lot; they are all masterpieces.
~Edouard Manet - in a letter to Fantin-Latour - while in Madrid in 1865, where he went to change his "ideas" after getting attacked by the critics when he exhibited Olympia at the Salon earlier that year.

Collagraph: The Written Word (& Akua Water-based Intaglio Inks)

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Del Pesco) — Sat, 20 Aug 2011 22:28:00 +0000

The Written Word 7x10 Collagraph with Akua Ink & Colored Pencil

I've been experimenting. Since I'm starting to print in my studio (instead of the community college print lab where they had ventilation), I'm looking for non-toxic solutions, and I hit the jackpot with Akua Water-based inks. I've tried a few other brands of water-based and water-soluble inks, and after watching a few demo videos on the Akua web site, and paying attention to some of the tips and tricks suggested by the manufacturers, and artists out there using their products, I am totally impressed. They *are* a bit different from the oil based inks I'm accustomed to; the viscosity, tack and wiping feels different, but the richness of the pigments, and the ink's adherence to & release from the plate is spot on. I can't wait to experiment more in the coming weeks.

The process shots start at the bottom of this post.

The first print I pulled, all dry a few weeks later, ready for some colored pencil fun. I've found through various experiments that colored pencil works wonderfully on top of oil-based inks, but it barely leaves a mark on water based inks, so I started this with low expectations. I was pleasantly surprised to find that colored pencil sticks to the Akua ink much better than any of the other water-based inks I've tried in the past.

Pulling the first blue-green over graphite print from the collagraph plate after a trip through the press. As you can see, there is still plenty of ink on the plate - I was able to pull three ghost prints without re-inking. Pretty nifty ink, that Akua stuff!

After pulling a print in the graphite, I mixed a little blue and green, and top-rolled the plate with a brayer. I'm using tarlatan cloth to wipe selected areas where I want a little less density of color & you can see how rich the pigments are in the Akua ink.

Using a scrap piece of mat board to coat the plate with Akua Intagio Ink in a beautiful color called Graphite.

I made this plate a few years ago in my garage. This angle shows the back of a piece of matboard, with a pencil sketch, followed by a coat of Liquitex Gloss Medium & Varnish on the front and back. After the varnish dried overnight, I incised lines and removed the top later of mat board in shapes with an exacto knife to create "wells" that will hold ink. I re-coated the plate with gloss medium three times during the cutting to seal the plate, and hold things down if the cuts were close together, or when I got overzealous with tearing away shapes.

Art Quote
It may perhaps be thought, that in prefacing a manual of drawing, I ought to expatiate on the reasons why drawing should be learned ; but those reasons appear to me so many and so weighty, that I cannot quickly state or enforce them. With the reader's permission, as this volume is too large already, I will waive all discussion respecting the importance of the subject, and touch only on those points which may appear questionable in the method of its treatment. In the first place, the book is not calculated for the use of children under the age of twelve or fourteen. I do not think it advisable to engage a child in any but the most voluntary practice of art. If it has talent for drawing, it will be continually scrawling on what paper it can get; and should be allowed to scrawl at its own free will, due praise being given for every appearance of care, or truth, in its efforts. It should be allowed to amuse itself with cheap colours almost as soon as it has sense enough to wish for them. If it merely daubs the paper with shapeless stains, the colour-box may be taken away till it knows better: but as soon as it begins painting red coats on soldiers, striped flags to ships, etc., it should have colours at command; and, without restraining its choice of subject in that imaginative and historical art, of a military tendency, which children delight in (generally quite as valuable, by the way, as any historical art delighted in by their elders), it should be gently led by the parents to try to draw, in such childish fashion as may be, the things it can see and like - as birds, or butterflies, or flowers, or fruit. In later years, the indulgence of using the colour should only be granted as a reward, after it has shown care and progress in its drawings with pencil. A limited number of good and amusing prints should always be within a boy's reach: in these days of cheap illustration he can hardly possess a volume of nursery tales without good woodcuts in it, and should be encouraged to copy what he likes best of this kind; but should be firmly restricted to a few prints and to a few books. ~from The Elements of Drawing, by John Ruskin (1920)

Collagraph: Sinking In (& using Carborundum on a plate)

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Del Pesco) — Wed, 24 Aug 2011 19:00:00 +0000

Sinking In 5.5 x 7 Collagraph printed on Arches Cover paper
#2 of 6 is available on Etsy
Process shots start at the bottom of this post.

After a full & fruitful day in the studio, the edition of six is finished and drying, with the little idea/reference doodle nearby.

After a trip through the press, pulling the print. You can get an idea in this shot about what the carborundum does; the ink coverage is rich and lovely.

Inking the plate with a variety of separate colors a la poupee.

You can see the black carborundum in the hair & brows on this shot. Now, I'm using Gloss Varnish again to attach a bit of tissue to the background for texture. I want this area to resemble a cross between bed sheets and water. After this was completely dry, I added one more coat of Gloss Medium & Varnish, front and back over the entire image.

The next day, I added more Gloss Medium to the areas where I wanted dark ink that wouldn't wipe away - the hair & brows. Before it dried, I used a small sieve to shake Daniel Smith Carborundum (#120) onto the plate. The grit in carborundum will adhere to the wet sections of the varnish and create ink-grabbing areas that will hold lots of pigment, even after I wipe the surface of the plate clear of all color. After letting it sit for a few hours, I tilted the plate and poured the carborundum onto a sheet of paper and then back through the sieve suspended over the Daniels Smith container, so any carborundum & varnish clumps would be kept from the clean stuff in the canister. (One thing I plan to try is using old coffee grounds as an alternative to carborundum; dry your used coffee grounds on newsprint in the sun, and then attach them to your plate the same way you would with the carborundum. I understand the texture and absorption of the grounds result in a velvety, rich dark that smells good too. :) )

This is one of the simplest and most direct methods of making a collagraph if you've never made one. This is the back of a piece of mat board. After sketching a young woman's face & hair, I used an exacto knife to incise lines around areas where I peeled the first layer of mat board away, leaving a shallow well to hold ink. After I finished cutting, I sealed the matboard front and back with three layers of Liquitex Gloss Medium & Varnish and let it dry over night. (You can see a bit of color on the matboard because I used watercolor to remind myself where I wanted shadow and/or texture.)

Art Quote
In August of 1888, Whistler married Beatrix Godwin, the widow of E. W. Godwin, the architect. She was a large, handsome woman, with a foreign appearance. Whistler took pleasure in the tradition that there was gypsy blood in her family (and he called her his Trixie.). She was intelligent, had been an art student, and was always interested in Whistler's work as an artist.
The following account of how their marriage was brought about is from Mr. Labouchere, the editor and owner of Truth:
"I believe that I am responsible for his marriage to the widow of Mr. Godwin, the architect. She was a remarkably pretty woman, and very agreeable, and both she and he were thorough Bohemians. I was dining with them and some others one evening at Earl's Court. They were obviously greatly attracted to each other, and in a vague sort of way they thought of marrying. So I took the matter in hand to bring things to a practical point. 'Jimmy,' I said, 'will you marry Mrs. Godwin ?'— * Certainly,' he replied.—' Mrs. Godwin,' I said, 'will you marry Jimmy? '—' Certainly,' she replied. —' When?' I asked. 'Oh, some day,' said Whistler.—'That won't do,' I said; 'we must have a date.' So they both agreed that I should choose the day, what church to come to for the ceremony, provide the clergyman, and give the bride away. I fixed an early date, and got the then Chaplain of the House of Commons (the Rev. Mr. Byng) to perform the ceremony. It took place a few days later.
"After the ceremony was over, we adjourned to Whistler's studio, where he had prepared a banquet. The banquet was on the table, but there were no chairs. So we sat on packing cases. The happy pair, when I left, had not quite decided whether they would go that evening to Paris, or remain in the studio. How unpractical they were was shown when I happened to meet the bride the day before the marriage in the street: "' Don't forget tomorrow,' I said.—' No,' she replied, 'I am just going to buy my trousseau.'— 'A little late for that, is it not?' I asked.—' No,' she answered, 'for I am only going to buy a new toothbrush and a new sponge, as one ought to have new ones when one marries.'"
It is a pleasure to add that Whistler found his wife a sympathetic companion, quick to comfort him in his disappointments and ready to rejoice with him in his successes. Their happy married life was ended by her untimely death from cancer in their home in May, 1896. ~Sketches of Great Painters, by Edwin Watts Chubb 1915

Monoprint: Three Eurekas!

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Del Pesco) — Thu, 25 Aug 2011 19:13:00 +0000

Three Eurekas! 6x8 Monoprint with colored pencil on Arches Cover paper
Process shots start at the bottom of this post
Available on Etsy.

After I finished playing with my groovy, new Akua Intaglio inks on the collagraph Sinking In, I had a small amount of ink left on my table, and I thought it would be more fun to make another print instead of storing it and cleaning up. (When it comes to clean up, I'm all about finding efficiencies.)

My cleaned Three Amigos collagraph plate, next to the Three Eurekas monoprint and a ghost print. I should mention here that the eventual clean up of my ink table was easy-peasey: soap and water. An enthused fist bump to the folks at Akua inks for making such a great product.

After a trip through the press with soaked & blotted Arches Cover paper, I'm pulling the print, and you can see how well the Akua ink releases from the plate. Since I wasn't sure how much ink would stay on the plate, I had one extra sheet of paper soaked & blotted, so I put it through the press to make a very faint ghost (you can see it in the second photo from the top).

If you follow this blog, you might remember this plate; I did a collagraph a few years ago called Three Amigos and I still love the circles & squares composition, so I used the plate again - but this time, to make a monoprint. My leftover Akua Intaglio ink is on the table in the back ground, and I've coated the plate loosely with color a la poupee via rolled felt "dollies", q-tips, my fingers and old paint brushes.

Art Quote
"The only thing noble about my parents," once said Rosa Bonheur, "was their character, which is more than many so-called aristocrats can boast." The genealogical table of the Bonheur family shows that for three generations the ancestors of Rosa were cooks —cooks, of course, who practised their calling with the skill and devotion that made it an art, but still no more than cooks. However, the father, Raymond Bonheur, was an artist in painting. Although three of his ancestors were but cooks, twelve of his fourteen lineal descendants were painters, sculptors, composers, and architects. Among these was his daughter Rosa, the most famous of his five children and the most famous of the women painters of the nineteenth century.
Rosa was born in Bordeaux, France, March 22, 1822. Upon the death of his wife, when Rosa was seven years old, the father moved to Paris, where he hoped to win that success which is the dream of every artist. He never became great, but the little girl who loved to watch her father at his work, and who liked still more to take rambles with him through the woods and country fields, early achieved that fame and prosperity which the father never acquired.
When Rosa decided to become a painter, she spent four years copying the masters in the Louvre before she concluded that her life work would be the painting of animals. She loved nature and had a passion for animated nature. In later years when she lived in the Rue d'Assas she owned and kept near her one horse, one he-goat, one otter, seven lapwings, two hoopoes, one monkey, one sheep, one donkey, and two dogs. ~Sketches of Great Artists, by Edwin Watts Chubb 1915

Collagraph: Cape Dory Book Club

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Del Pesco) — Sat, 27 Aug 2011 19:00:00 +0000

Cape Dory Book Club 7.25 x 10 Collagraph & Watercolor [Artist Proof]
Available on Etsy.
The reference photo for this collagraph was taken many years ago, while sailing for a week along the Intracoastal Waterway on the east coast, on board the 31' Cape Dory cutter 'Heiress'.
Process shots begin at the bottom of this post.
Pulling the first print - an artist proof. After this proof was dry, I added watercolor, which lead me back to the plate to do a little more cutting & a bit more carborundum. This will be a fun to print, as I'll get to experiment with color on each piece in the edition (15).

After a trip under the press, with soaked and blotted paper on top of the plate, you can see the results of the pressure; the paper is embossed with the shape of the voids I cut & peeled out of the mat board.

After adding goss medium to the pencil marked channels, and pouring carborundum on them, I let everything dry, removed any excess grit, and coated the whole plate front & back with one more layer of Gloss Medium Varnish. In this shot, I've inked the plate using the a la poupee method - rolled and taped felt, or "dollies" - dipped into ink, and them rubbed on the plate in areas where you'd like that particular color. This is a great way to do a multiple color print from one plate, with one pass through the press, and the effects are often quite painterly.

I planned to use carborundum on this plate, after the fun experiments on the Sinking In collagraph earlier this week, so I've scribbled pencil in specific furrows to map where I want to add gloss medium to adhere the grit, which will give me some rich dark areas when they're inked.

This is another simple crescent mat board collagraph plate, sealed with a few layers of Liquitex Gloss Medium Varnish. I'm peeling the top layer off the back of the mat board to make geometric moats where the ink can loiter. The gloss medium makes peeling easier because it gives the top layer of mat board a plastic texture that doesn't rip unless it's been cut with an exacto knife.

Art Quote
The early stages of any craft are more interesting when we are familiar with the final result. For this reason it is often an advantage to beginat the end.
To see a few impressions taken from a set of blocks in colour printing, or to print them oneself, gives the best possible idea of the quality and essential character of print-making. So also in describing the work it will perhaps tend to make the various stages clearer if the final act of printing is first explained. The most striking characteristic of this craft is the primitive simplicity of the act of printing. No press is required, and no machinery.
A block is laid flat on the table with its cut surface uppermost, and is kept steady by a small wad of damp paper placed under each corner. A pile of paper slightly damped ready for printing lies within reach just beyond the wood-block, so that the printer may easily lift the paper sheet by sheet on to the block as it is required.
It is the practice in Japan to work squatting on the floor, with the blocks and tools also on the floor in front of the craftsman. Our own habit of working at a table is less simple, but has some advantages. One practice or habit of the Japanese is, however, to be followed with particular care. No description can give quite fully the sense of extreme orderliness and careful deliberation of their work. Everything is placed where it will be most convenient for use, and this orderliness is preserved throughout the day's work. Their shapely tools and vessels are handled with a deftness that shames our clumsy ways, and everything that they use is kept quite clean. This skilful orderliness is essential to fine craftmanship, and is a sign of mastery. ~Wood-Block Printing by F. Morley Fletcher 1916

Drawing: Portrait Study-Lury (& Daniel Sprick workshop)

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Del Pesco) — Mon, 19 Sep 2011 18:01:00 +0000

Portrait Study - Lury 18x16 Charcoal on Canford paper

Last week, I went to Monterey, CA to attend Weekend with the Masters - the art workshop and conference hosted by American Artist magazine and a handful of art supply vendors. Just like last year, I left the event on the verge of spontaneous combustion of the brain. Hundreds of artists from all over the U.S. are under the same roof for four days; the all-art-all-the-time energy was palpable and fascinating. (Imagine talking about brushes & various papers for an hour over lunch with no one getting bored! Or just by chance, meeting a group of attendees who have admired the same artist online and in publications, and for the first time, will watch him/her demo a painting live & discuss process - together.) Conferences like this are the antidote for any artist who spends days and weeks working alone in the studio. There were about 26 instructors on site, so attendees had a chance to take multiple classes and attend various demos from 5-8 outstanding artists in just a few days. Instructors also got a chance to meet each other - some for the first time - and I saw many of them wandering in and out of the classes of their peers to listen in, or paint/draw for awhile. Evenings were dotted with clusters of kindred spirit attendees and instructors - huddled over dinner & drinks - talking about exhibits, museums, galleries, process, marketing and supplies - late into the night. The energy level and stimulus at events like this make focusing enough to draw or paint challenging to me, so I usually opt for demos where I can watch, take notes and just absorb. I made an exception for the all day session with Daniel Sprick - one of my favorite contemporary painters. He did a demo for us in the first half (photos below) and we did drawings or paintings of the model with him in the second half (my unfinished study is above).

Daniel set up his easel relatively close to the model and used a small panel and Cobra water miscible oil paints - which were new to him (a gift from the manufacturer attending the event).

Daniel's portrait was started with a line drawing of the model's head and features, laid in very light with vine charcoal, followed by a broad fill in with thinned pigment - which obliterated what he laid in with the charcoal. When asked why he brushed his charcoal drawing away with the paint, he smiled and said you should trust that if you can lay features in once with charcoal, you'll be able to place them again with paint. And it's a second chance to get it right. In the shot above, he went back into the flat mass of the shape of the model's head and started blocking in shadow patterns and making adjustments to the curves of the model's face and cheekbones.

Daniel's palette for the portrait (Cobra Water Miscible Oils)

Daniel uses a mahl stick to steady his hand for the smaller or finer brushwork.

He laid in daubs of color with deliberate, slow placement, and made jokes about how kind we all were to stay and watch such unexciting stuff. We assured him that we were enjoying every minute of watching him work.

Daniel uses a fan brush - held lightly at the tail of the handle - to gently soften edges over a brow or cheekbone of the bridge of the nose, etc.

I know it's cliche, but watching the face emerge from the panel under his brushes was akin to a magic show. He is such a masterful painter, and this was just a two hour demo. He told us that he normally works 12 hours interrupted on the first day of painting a head. Yet another artist telling a room of learners that good art takes time, deliberation, a plan, and long, uninterrupted days of work.

I posted these photos and many more - including a demo on the stage of the auditorium of the Portola Hotel - with Daniel Sprick and Quang Ho painting from the same model. You can see them here on facebook.
Art Quote
I'm 77 this year, and I'm seeing more and more color with a better-trained eye. I think I need two more lifetimes to get painting down. But I don't have that "artistic angst". Painting is a joy, and I'm grateful every time I pick up a brush that this is my vocation. We should all paint like a pig eats.

~Richard Shmid at 2011 Weekend with the Masters

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Del Pesco) — Wed, 21 Sep 2011 17:30:00 +0000

On the Cusp of the Next Chapter 9x7 Monotype with colored pencil

Available on Etsy

(Process shots begin at the bottom of this post.)

With my reference photo (an iphone snapshot of one of my nieces, taken with the instamatic filter) nearby, I'm using colored pencils to refine the young girl's features, and I'm adding some darker areas in my imaginary hedge behind her.

Soaked and blotted heavy weight Arches cover paper is laid on top of the plexiglass with the painting face up, and then newsprint is laid on top of the Arches paper to protect the press blankets from any bleed through or staining from the pigments. After a trip through the press, the monotype is pulled from the plexiglass plate.

This is a beveled plexiglass plate with an under-drawing done in water-soluble crayons. I'm adding watercolor here; the crayons give the watercolor something to cling to, which keeps the wet pigments from repelling the slick plexi surface and pooling in little piles like water on glass. You still get quite a bit of that, but less so when you lay the crayons in first - and the pooling is a good thing because it keeps the image less fussy - and ~~encourages~~ insists upon a more painterly approach.

P.S. I have more to write about Weekend with the Masters, but will have to share on another blog post. :)

Art Quote

In 1894, Whistler exhibited three small marines, which he had painted off-shore while the boatman steadied his boat. They were fresh and crisp - so good that a great painter of marines said of them in an exhibition: "They over-topped everything about them." Two were sold and he showed a third to an American who came to the studio. The caller said at once he would be only too glad to take it at price named; the matter was apparently closed, and the buyer sailed for home, leaving a friend to get the picture. A day or two after, Whistler stood looking long and earnestly at the little marine, saying half to himself: "It is good, isn't it?" Then he took the canvas from the frame and said "I think it needs touching up a little." Another pause, then "Do you know, I believe I won't let this go just yet. I want to go over it once more. I can send your friend something else next winter - something that he might like better. And if he doesn't like it, why, he can return it." "But, Mr. Whistler, he wants this little marine. There is not much to do upon it, is there?" "Nooo-o; but, then, you see...." "Well, why not give it the last touches now, and let him have it. If you do not send him this, I am afraid he will never have one of your pictures." "Oh, yes he will - next winter..." "But, next winter others will come in when we are not here, and buy from you whatever you have'" "Well, we will see." And only persistent urgings, day after day, even after a draft on London had been forced upon him, induced him to ship the painting. At no time was there any question of price or money involved; he simply didn't wish to part with the last of his three marines. It was not until about 1890, and after, that Whistler's paintings began to sell at anything like their real worth. To his credit be it said, his work was never "popular". By his independence, his seeming defiance of all conventional and academic notions in his art, his eccentricities, and his lack of commercial instincts, he managed, at a very early period in his career, to alienate: Dealers, Painters and the Public... the three factors upon which commercial success depends.

~Recollections and impressions of James A. McNeill Whistler by Jerome Eddy 1903

Color Monotype: Berlin Breakfast

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Del Pesco) — Thu, 29 Sep 2011 05:03:00 +0000

Berlin Breakfast 7x10 Monotype with Colored Pencil
Available on Etsy.
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On a gray day in Berlin in 1987, in an apartment in the city, I snapped a photo of my friends talking at the breakfast table, backlit by tall windows. I've loved the light, the composition and the subject of this photo for over twenty years, and I have always meant to paint the scene. I finally pulled the photo out last week to make this monotype, and now that I've played with it on plexiglass, I'm all a-flutter to make a linocut, and a graphite drawing, and a watercolor of the same scene. Was that part of my plan? Because I do have a plan for the work I want to do this Fall, right? [Just between us, it was *not* part of my plan for the next few weeks, but... I don't even have an excuse.] Maybe I'm swelling with nostalgia; the memories of traveling with dear friends twenty four years ago, combined with the love for this particular composition, and the people in it, and the notion that I really, really want to get the image RIGHT. I see all my drafting hiccups in this monotype, and that translates to opportunities to re-work it, and do it over, and over, till I get closer to Truth. If I keep working on it - in graphite, and as a linocut and as a watercolor - I'm bound to get familiar enough with the nuance of the light, the backlit values and shapes in front of me. I'm old fashioned, and I believe it's always good to nail the drawing - the bones of the painting - before you take it down a path where there is room for expression and free association. With so many visits to the photo as I work it into a linocut, or a drawing, or a watercolor - hopefully, within that well-worn, often visited room of familiarity, I can twirl around in creative license, and make it better.

After a trip through the press, against soaked and blotted Arches Cover paper, pulling the monotype.

A beveled piece of milky plexiglass, with a drawing done in Caran D'Ache Water Soluble Crayons, followed by layers of watercolor on top of the line work.

Art Quote

In 1926, a year after Sargent's death, Adrian Stokes, who had accompanied the artist to the Alps, described what had inspired his late friend to paint particular watercolor:

Sargent's watercolors... usually record, with the utmost directness, something that had excited his admiration, or appealed to his artistic intelligence. That may have been the clearly defined and exquisite edge of some rare object; of the way in which a dark thing, when opposed to vivid light, is invaded by it, and loses local color; or the change that seems to occur in the color of things along the edge where they meet. ~The Watercolors of John Singer Sargent, by Carl Little 1998

Monotype: Furry Blessings

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Del Pesco) — Tue, 04 Oct 2011 01:08:00 +0000

Furry Blessings 7.25x9 Monotype & Watercolor

Available on Etsy.

Close up of the painterly, layered texture you can get with this method of monotype.

On a sheet of beveled plexiglass (using a milky piece of LEXAN from Home Depot on this one), I'm drawing with water soluble crayons to give watercolors something to hold onto.

Adding layers of watercolor (gently - one pass of the brush), and letting the paint pool and bleed and mix where it wants to. Trying to control the process in this method will lead to frustration, so it's best to throw caution to the wind and just play.

In the spirit of playing, I've spritzed the plate generously just before printing, because I wanted to see if the pigments would dry a bit more saturated & bright if I printed on dry paper. I've found in previous experiments this Fall that pigments bleed deep into soaked & blotted paper, often all the way to the back, which leads to a dull finish with less saturation and vibrancy in the print.

Quite a bit of the crayon and watercolor released from the plate after being spritzed, so I'll continue with experiments and try a fine spritz on just the paper next time. After this dried, I went back in with watercolor, and lightly added a few more layers of pigment, but I left it pretty loose, resulting in the monotype at the top of this post.

Art Quote

A few days after my arrival in Los Angeles in November, 1887, and just as soon as I was miraculously delivered from the tender mercies of a host of Philistines, called real estate men, I found myself, one Sunday morning, strolling cityward on Washington Street, far out beyond the Rosedale Cemetery. It was after the first rains, and I felt full of the delicious vitality and charm which the first rains give. Sauntering off the road to peruse an interesting announcement which offered a big bargain to the first man who came quick enough with a deposit, I came to the edge of a pool, a lodgment of the rain in a hollow, a pool just sixteen yards across, and in it, or upon it, was a vision of loveliness that I shall never forget. I have lingered by the silvery mirrors of other lands, and have haunted the richest bits of dear old England's lakes and streams, the inspiration of poets and the paradise of artists, but, except on one occasion, when, riding past the garden of the poet Wordsworth, I saw the glory of a most perfect reflex in Rydal Water, I had never seen anything surpassing this. Such a vision of pure and tender color in water, with such perfect definition of detail, it is impossible to describe, and until you take an opportunity of looking into that or a similar pool, with your face cityward, you cannot realize the enchantment. At my feet was the ethereal blue of a rapturous sky, and against it was the spotless snow of Old Baldy's crown, glistening under the sheen of the water like a celestial thing. The pearly gray shadows of the monarch beneath it came out with the sharpness and clearness of a touch of a pencil, while all the great range from Garvanza to Rialto was as clear and defined as the stones in the foreground. The city came next, its turrets and towers clear-cut against the gray of the mountains; its red-painted roofs and the interspersed foliage looking as bright as the blush of a maiden. Then, fringing the face of the city, were line upon line of pepper and tall eucalyptus, interspersed with the gables, and chimneys, and windmills which stretch 'twixt Washington Gardens and Rosedale; then, at the far edge of the mirror, the tender, sweet shoots of new herbage and grasses reflected their modest new beauty, and when I looked up, and glanced at the vision reflected, I fell into wondrous amazement, and knew not which most to admire, — the substance, or only the shadow.

The undefined and inexpressible thrill of the artist as he looks out upon the rolling landscape in vernal beauty, or upon the mountains melting in the golden glory of our common sunsets, is as much above the pleasure of the millionaire as he counts his gold as is the reality of the rippling laughter of your little child at play to the forced guffaw of a salaried clown. ~Talks in My Studio - The Art of Seeing, by John Ivey 1903

Monotype: Countenance

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Del Pesco) — Thu, 06 Oct 2011 03:43:00 +0000

Countenance 10.5 x 8.25 Monotype with Colored Pencil on paper

Process shots begin at the bottom of this post.

Available for sale on Etsy.
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Close up - mark making with colored pencil on top of Caran D'Ache and Watercolor.

Holding Countenance for a sense of scale, after working on her with colored pencil. She's a little bit bigger than life sized.

The beauty of a monotype: you clean the plate (in this case, with water and a paper towel), and start all over on something else. With every pull of a new monotype, your creative brain is lured towards ideas, materials and methods to try with the next one.

Pulling the print from the plate; lots of pigment transfer from the plexiglass to the paper, and some nice surprises in swirled textures and colors after the pigments mixed under pressure.

The paper after a trip through the press; visible plate impression, and a little bleed through on the crayons and watercolor.

Laying a sheet of soaked & blotted Arches Cover paper on top of the plate on the press bed in a newsprint sandwich to protect the press blankets from any seepage of pigments.

Layering dry (Caran D'Ache Water Soluble Crayons) and wet (WN Watercolors) pigments on the surface of a beveled sheet of milky, opaque LEXAN plexiglass.

Art Quote

There is no way of explaining the Italian fondness for form and color other than by considering the necessities of the people and the artistic character of the Italian mind. Art in all its phases was not only an adornment but a necessity of Christian civilization. The Church taught people by sculpture, mosaic, miniature, and fresco. It was an object-teaching, a grasping of ideas by forms seen in the mind, not a presenting of abstract ideas as in literature. Printing was not known. There were few manuscripts, and the majority of people could not read. Ideas came to them for centuries through form and color, until at last the Italian mind took on a plastic and pictorial character. It saw things in symbolic figures, and when the Renaissance came and art took the lead as one of its strongest expressions, painting was but the color-thought and form-language of the people. And these people, by reason of their peculiar education, were an exacting people, knowing what was good and demanding it from the artists. Every Italian was, in a way, an art critic, because every church in Italy was an art school. The artists may have led the people, but the people spurred on the artists, and so the Italian mind went on developing and unfolding until at last it produced the great art of the Renaissance.

~A Text-Book of the History of Painting, by John C. Van Dyke, 1894

Monotype: New to California

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Del Pesco) — Sun, 23 Oct 2011 18:27:00 +0000

New to California 6.5 x 4.5 Monotype with colored pencil

Available on Etsy.

Another experiment with monotype printmaking - this time, I used caran d'ache water soluble crayons to sketch features, and then painted loosey-juicey layers of Akua Kolor waterbased inks on a little 4x6 beveled zinc plate I've used to make lots and lots of monotypes. (I'm not sure how other printmakers feel about this, but when I use a plate over and over, through a chapter of years in my studio, it becomes an object of my affection. This little sheet of zinc has been the support for tons of experimental prints, completely failed attempts, ah-hah-surprises and happy accidents... I love starting new things with it. We have history - me and this plate. We're good buds.)

I've got Akua Kolor squeezed out on a piece of plexiglass as my palette above: Hansa Yellow, Crimson Red and Ultramarine Blue. I planned to print it right away, while the ink was still very wet, but suddenly, it was dinnertime, and we started talking about good pizza, and cold beer, and before I knew it, we were in the car, driving to Chi-Chi's.

The next morning, the plate was completely dry. Akua Kolor doesn't normally dry (until it's printed and the ink soaks into your paper). The pigment on my palette was still wet from the night before, but the layers I painted on the zinc plate were mixed with the caran d'ache crayons, so I think the alchemy of the two changed both mediums to something dry and shiny-hard on the plate. I could run my hand over the image, and the pigment felt as hard as porcelain paint.

I put the zinc plate on a piece of matboard on the press bed to raise it up a little - for better pressure from the roller, and then laid a soaked and very lightly blotted piece of Somerset paper on top. After a slow pass through the press, I got some - but not all - of the pigment off the plate. The pigment really bonded to the metal, so now I know - I have to prep the surface with a little release agent - like Gum Arabic, before I start drawing or painting, especially if I'm going to mix pigment media like Caran D'ache & Akua Kolor.

My trusty little plate, the monotype and the mat board I used under the zinc.

Onto the next experiment.... :)

Art Quote
I am going to try to explain to you why I exhibit at the Salon. In Paris, there are scarcely fifteen collectors capable of liking a painter without the backing of the Salon. And there are another eighty thousand who won't buy so much as a post card unless the painter exhibits there. That's why every year, I send two portraits, however small.... This entry is entirely of a commercial nature. Anyway, it's like some medicine - if it does you no good, it won't do you any harm.
~Pierre-August Renoir, in a letter to his dealer Paul Durand-Ruel - 1881 (The Salon was open to the public that year for two months, and 300,000 people attended.)

Monotype: Not Camera Shy

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Del Pesco) — Mon, 24 Oct 2011 17:06:00 +0000

Not Camera Shy 6.6 x 5.5 Monotype with Watercolor
Available on Etsy.

I was talking with an incredible artist friend of mine - Priscilla Treacy - about supports for monotypes, and she suggested frosted mylar as a printmaking plate, with a piece of matboard underneath while it's on the press bed to raise it up a little higher, if you have the benefit of a press. (I'm glad to be a new member of that Club, but more on that later.) I remembered that I had some mylar for colored pencil drawing, so I pulled a piece out and did a little experiment with Caran D'Ache water soluble crayons and Akua Kolor printmaking inks.

When I pulled the monotype - I understood why Priscilla suggested coating the mylar first with Gum Arabic as a release agent, and I will do that on the next mylar monotype, since so much of the pigment stayed on the plate (right side of the image above). I had to use Dawn dish soap and a scrubber to get the dried pigments off the mylar, but this could be a result of the Flying-by-the-Seat-of-my-Pants-Chemistry I'm dancing with, by mixing Akua Inks and Caran D'Ache crayons. To make up for the left-behind pigments, I added watercolor to the monotype to increase the contrast in a few areas, but the watery, painterly, loose patterns in the print are very appealing to me, and I'll be doing more of them this week.

Art Quote

One evening, Rosa Bonheur (1822-1899) was dining with me and some friends. Among the latter was a young lady recently married, who related to us an account of the furnishing of her house. All the rooms were finished except the dining room; for this last, her husband could not, for the moment, give her the money, and she was compelled to hold her little receptions in her sleeping room. After dinner, Rosa asked me for a large sheet of drawing paper, and while we were talking and she herself smoking a cigarette, she sketched a delightful hunting scene, which she signed with her full name. Then, under cover of a general conversation on music, as tea was being served, she approached the young wife and said to her: "Take this picture to (Benjamin) Todesco, on your return to Paris, and he will give you at least fifteen hundred francs for it. Then, you will be able to furnish your drawing room."

~French Landscape painter, Joseph Verdier writing about his friend, the painter Rosa Bonheur

Monotype: Last Roses of the Season

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Del Pesco) — Wed, 26 Oct 2011 20:28:00 +0000

Last Roses of the Season 8.5 x 7 Monotype on Arches Cover paper
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Fall is here in the California desert, with squinty-bright light, cool mornings and scattered leaves. The very last roses in my garden are wind-blown and crumpled, but I've been bringing them inside just the same, to collect their breathy, floral scents, and stand them up in a small ceramic pitcher my great grandmother made.

I love the painterly affect you get with this type of printmaking. I also think it's excellent for the way it almost demands a loose approach, even if your (my) tendency is to be tight and more illustrative, the resulting monotype is so much more exciting to look at with all that fluid mark-making and random pigment colors bumping together under the pressure of the press. I think I need to make another one immediately. :)

I was really pleased with how well the pigments released from the mylar in this one. The gum arabic definitely worked, and I also love the way the brush marks and scumbling I did with my finger tips on the wet pigments stayed in pattern on the print.

I mentioned in my last post that my amazmo-artist friend Priscilla Treacy suggested that I'd get more pigment to release from the frosted mylar plate if I coated the surface first with gum arabic, so I did that - very diluted and thinly - the night before. I also put just a drop of it in my rinse water before I started to paint this loose rendition of my garden roses.

Art Quote
Frank Benson and Edmund Tarbell (and often Joseph DeCamp) were invariably identified as a subgroup within the Ten American Painters. At least one critic noted the lack of Impressionist elements in their first submissions to the Ten's group shows. "Tarbell has recently suffered something like an eclipse of light and color. Several years ago both (Benson & Tarbell) were producing strong and spirited work, but just now, they seem to be wandering in dusky light, using washed out hues and questionable charm." Benson's response to this criticism was to submit to the Ten's exhibitions a flourish of outdoor pictures of his family basking in the summer sun in fashionable white attire. Tarbell responded with a group of Impressionist paintings (through 1906) but then suddenly turned away from these outdoor pictures to concentrate exclusively on interiors and pure portraiture. Interestingly, most of the final works of Tarbells' peak Impressionist period were exhibited with the Ten, and all were portrayals of family members in outdoor settings. ~Laurene Buckley, Edmund Tarbell, Poet of Domesticity

Monotype: Dry Dock Huddle

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Del Pesco) — Fri, 28 Oct 2011 17:26:00 +0000

Dry Dock Huddle 8.5 x 7 Monotype on Arches Cover paper
Available on Etsy.

Pulling the monotype from the mylar plate, supported underneath by a sheet of matboard cut to the same size as the mylar.

My reference photo on the left is a little grainy and over-exposed, but there's enough information to draw the basic shapes of the sailboats in dry dock. I used straight watercolor over caran d'ache crayons on this one, after treating the mylar plate with just a drop of rubbed on liquid dish soap the night before to help the pigments stick (and release). The swell of boat hulls when they're raised out of the water has always intrigued me - like suspended whales - in for maintenance - anxiously waiting to get back to the sea.

I received an email from printmaker Carol Hetherington this week, suggesting the dish soap treatment above, and mentioning a couple of material options for monotype plates. She uses 1/16" lightly sanded Styrene sheets - also known as Polystyrene - which is a little more flexible than Lexan (polycarbonate) - the plexiglass sheets I've been using for both monotypes and dry points. I have a stack of various brands and weights of polycarbonate sheets, but I've never tried polystyrene. Have you? Please feel free to share your experiences in the comments.

Art Quote

Some years ago Whistler showed a visitor several heads of Italian children, each about 10 or 12, by 16 or 18 inches in size. With them was a three-quarter length of one of the children. They were all superb bits of portraiture, and akin to the Little Rose of Lyme Regis - in the Boston Museum of Fine Arts. The visitor was eager to get one or more of the pictures. After considerable pressure, he said :

"I think they ought to be worth six hundred guineas each; don't you?"

"And the large one?" said the visitor.

"Oh, the same. That is no more important than the small.”

"Very well. May I have all four?"

"Dear me ! You don't want them all?"

"If you will let me have them."

" But.... " and then the struggle began, "I must look them over; they are not quite finished."

“But, surely, these two are finished."

"Yes, I might let those go by-and-bye, but not now."

"Will you send them to me ?"

"Yes, certainly, after I have gone over them again."

"I will leave a check."

"God bless me, no! You must not do that. It will be time enough to send a check after you receive the little pictures."

Needless to say, the pictures were never received. They had just been finished, and he could not bring himself to part with them. It was not a matter of money at all — likely as not he sold them later for less — but it was always next to impossible to get him to part with recent work. If he happened to have on hand a picture five or ten years old, possibly, that could be bought and taken away, but anything in which he was interested at the time he would not let go.

~Recollections and impressions of James A. McNeill Whistler by Jerome Eddy 1903

Watercolor: Slow it Down

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Del Pesco) — Mon, 07 Nov 2011 19:29:00 +0000

Slow it Down 5.25x3.75 Watercolor on paper

Available on Etsy.

Here's a little watercolor study, while I work on finishing a larger-than-I've-ever-made (18x24) monotype of an interior. I hope to print the monotype today after a few adjustments to color & values. This petite study was painted after sifting through some family photos from the early 80's. There's always something fun to paint in that stack of images (after dinner, with a glass of wine). :) Happy Art-Making to all of you... It's Make Something Monday. Not really, but let's just call it that, and get to work, shall we?

Art Quote

Maxfield Parrish never lacked commissions, critical acclaim, prizes, the resultant fame or other rewards for his artistic endeavors. He seemed to search for a means to balance beauty in every detail, every brush stroke; his graphic designs combined with proportion, subtlety and grace. His vision came early in life and it flourished to the end. Consequently, Parrish works are timeless. He led an extraordinary life and designed its style as neatly as he laid out masonite panels on which to paint.

Then, abruptly, in 1931, Parrish changed focus. Halting all that had made him successful and famous, he began anew, as a landscape artist. His father, Stephen, had followed exactly the same pattern. After years of critical acclaim as an etcher, Stephen Parrish suddenly became an easel painter, painting landscapes until he died in his 90's.

Maxfield Parrish followed his father's pattern to the letter. Famous for illustrating everything from toys, games, magazines and book illustrations to advertisements and art prints, he painted only landscape scenes after 1931. Maxfield Parrish died in 1966 at the age of 95, at his beloved New Hampshire home, The Oaks.

~from Maxfield Parrish - a Retrospective, by Laurene S. Cutler

Woodcut: Josephine

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Del Pesco) — Fri, 11 Nov 2011 02:01:00 +0000

Josephine 4.25 x 3.5 Woodcut with Watercolor

Available on Etsy.

This woodcut was chosen for the Georgetown, Texas Arts & Culture program Current: Banner Project. Josephine (above) is one of fifty four banners on display in downtown Georgetown. The project was created and produced by Nick Ramos of Graphismo, and will be on display till November 20th, 2011.

The woodcut was carved from a block of Shina wood, inspired by beautiful photos of the entertainer Josephine Baker, and influenced by the illustrations of Jessie Willcox Smith (1863-1935) In the photo above, I'm testing the print, or making an Artists' Proof - usually marked with A/P in the lower margin: ink was rolled onto my carved block and pressed against a small piece of Arches Cover paper so I could see if any more of the wood should be cut away.

After the block was inked and printed to complete the edition, the wood was cleaned and dried, and stored with a stack of others in a shoe box in my studio. When a limited edition is printed in full (in this case, there are 20 prints), the artist usually destroys the plate by carving a big X on the face of the block, or drilling holes in the corners. This ensures that no more then the edition of 20 are printed, and it's called "striking the plate". I prefer to burn my plates in a fire pit on chilly winter evenings with a glass of wine. It feels a little more ceremonious, and it keeps my feet warm. :)

So, now I have a nice little stack of woodcuts, and each one will be painted with watercolors in different shades, depending on my whims at the time. How about you? What have you printed lately?

Art Quote

For three centuries the fame of Velasquez has been growing until modern critics and artists have come to consider him, at least in regard of technique, the greatest of all painters. Whistler said of him that Art " had dipped the Spaniard's brush in light and air." And Henri Regnault wrote, "Standing before a work of Velasquez, I feel as if I were looking at reality through an open window." It is this sense of reality that impresses one in seeing a Velasquez. There have been painters with greater power to move the feelings, with a keener insight into the mystery of nature, with a magic quicker to kindle the imagination, with a brush dipped into tenderer, more somber, or more gorgeous colors, but none whose hand has held the mirror up to life more accurately. The artists in Rome thought that Velasquez alone painted reality, the others painted mere decorative convention.

He left no school of imitators, for who can imitate perfection? Yet his influence upon modern art is second to that of none. Regnault, Manet, CarolusDuran, Monet, Whistler, Degas, and Sargent have been his devoted admirers. "Corot and Millet," writes F. A. M. Stevenson, " took his principles into the open air; the first painting landscapes with figures, the second figures with landscapes."

Diego Rodriguez Velasquez de Silva was born in Seville in 1599. He belongs to that era so productive of genius, the era of Shakspere, Cervantes, Montaigne, Kepler, Galileo, Tasso, Guido Reni, Rembrandt, Van Dyck, and Rubens. At thirteen we find him studying painting under Herrera; then for five years he studied under Pacheco, a man of learning but not a great master in art. He had a charming daughter, charming at least to the young Velasquez, for he married her. From teachers such as these, Velasquez absorbed all they had to give. In the house of Pacheco he met the artists, poets, scholars, and gentlemen of the city, and became conversant with the best of them in manners and culture.

In 1623, when he was 24 , he was summoned by Olivarez, the all-powerful minister of Philip IV, requesting the young artist to come to Madrid. Attended by his mulatto slave, Jean Parejo - who himself became so expert a painter that some of his work has been attributed to his master - Velasquez journeyed to Madrid. In a friend's house he lodged and there painted a portrait which was soon carried to the palace by the son of a chamberlain of one of the princes. An hour later the prince, the king, and the king's brother had gathered about the portrait in admiration, and the future of Velasquez was assured.

Sketches of Great Painters, by Edwin Watts Chubb 1915

Monotype: Monterey Retreat

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Del Pesco) — Wed, 16 Nov 2011 02:00:00 +0000

Monterey Retreat 18 x 24 Monotype on Arches Cover paper
Process shots start at the bottom of this post.

Holding the monotype - Monterey Retreat - to give a sense of scale. (Sorry for the yellow pallor from my kitchen lights.) This is by far the largest print I've ever made, and I'm pretty darned excited to make another one.

After a trip through the press, the print was pulled and laid over the roller, and the plate is on the press bed. I let the print dry over night, and added more watercolor the next day to areas that needed a little darkening for stronger shadows.

Here's a little close up of the plate just before I printed, to confess that there's always a risk of cat fur in my art supplies, and sometimes, it finds a way into my work. I pulled these little feline hairs out before printing. (Scout is contentedly purring & yawning behind me as I type this.)

My awesome step dad TC made me a drawing bridge, which you can see here, supporting my forearm while I paint with watercolors, so I don't rest directly on the pigments. Both feet of the bridge are covered in thick felt so they won't damage the plate or the paper I'm working on. When I was printmaking in the Print Lab at College of the Canyons, they fabricated bridges in the wood shop and painted them bright yellow with the hope that the color would make them hard to steal. By the end of the semester, there was only one left, so my step dad made them a pile of new ones. He's that kind of nice guy (lucky me). If you don't have a woodworking person in close proximity, you can buy a very fancy one online here and here.

Before I started working on this mondo plate, I coated the surface the night before with Gum Arabic (which was the perfect time to breath deep and give myself a pep talk about printing large). Then, I made a grid on the surface with white Caran D'ache water soluble crayons, and laid the drawing in with a burnt siena crayon.

As an aside, this handy-dandy little item is another Lowes goody: an all purpose tub, which works very nicely for soaking paper before printing. (And it was $7.00) Need to soak paper but someone's in the bath tub? No worries, just grab your new Tough Tub!

I also like to use the rasp to file down the pointy corners. This helps to reduce the inadvertent poke in the ribs or scratch across the forearm when you're handling the plate, and it makes a really nice plate impression on the four corners of your print.

After I finished sanding the entire surface, I used a medium to fine metal rasp, to file a forty five degree bevel on all four sides of the polycarbonate plate. When the angle felt right, I switched to 320 sand paper to smooth the grooves left by the rasp in the bevel so they won't hold ink or paint during printing.

There are a couple of reasons for beveling a plate, and they're kind of important to note here; If you're printing on a press (especially a borrowed press), with layers of wool and felt blankets and a rubber pusher, the sharp right angle on the edge of your un-beveled plate under heavy pressure from the roller on the press will slice right through a full set of blankets during printing. That would be very bad. (Press blankets are expensive.) Another reason - the same chop-chop, slice & dice from the un-beveled edge of your plate can go through your paper too. So, instead of a nice plate impression in your sheet of BFK Rives, you're paper will be cut to the exact size of your plate, with no margins around your print. Not as crucial as the first scenario, but worth avoiding. The last reason (I promise) relates to cutting your hands; a sharp right angle on the plate is really easy to cut yourself with - whether you're using metal or acrylic plates. You'll handle the plate a lot - during surface prep, inking, wiping, moving back and forth between the press and your work surface, and cleaning. It's really not fun to slice your palm open around inks, solvents and cleaners. It's so much safer to bevel the sharp edge off the top of your plate. Don't forget to also use a course sand block (see above) to scuff the bottom edge, because it can get razor sharp as the bevel sweeps to the base of that slope.

The Polycarbonate sheet is secured to my table with a bit of overhang on two sides. I've put a sheet of paper underneath as a cushion, and a scrap of watercolor paper under the grip of the Bessey to protect the plate surface. I used 320 grit sandpaper (with a respirator on - you don't want to breath this stuff) to sand the surface gently & evenly in a circular motion from edge to edge all over one side of the plate. This will give the plate a little bit of tooth so it'll hold pigment without a lot of beading up. (Watercolor, especially, repels the surface of polycarbonate, so it gathers like little beads of mercury when you paint on the plate. The scuffed surface helps, but it'll still bead a little bit unless you treat your plate beforehand with a thin coat of gum arabic.)

I have a trusty set of Besseys: 2" x 4" Wood Clamps. I use them to hold acrylic or metal plates firmly against a table - with a bit of overhang so I can use a metal rasp to file the edges of the plate into a nice bevel. (Bevels are a good thing.)

I've prepped plenty of small (4x6, 5x5) plexiglass plates for making monotypes and dry point engravings, but I had a hankering to make a larger plate. Since so many folks have written to ask about how to prepare a plexiglass plate for printmaking, I've documented the process here so you can play along. Above, I'm using an 18x24 Polycarbonate sheet (.080 inches, Optix brand - from Lowes). And in the interest of full disclosure, the dimensions of this plate feel totally HUUUUGE to me, as in Gigantoid! - How will I cover that whole thing with an image?!

Art Quote

Artistic bigotry is quite narrowing in its tendency, as bigotry of any other kind, and is equally an obstacle to the perception of broad, underlying truths. There is no possibility of settling on any one theory of painting as the best. Every student, after having been well grounded in the general principles of art, must find out the particular way of work with which he, individually, can produce the most satisfactory results; but while pursuing his own chosen line, must keep his mind and feeling open to what is good in all lines. It too often happens that a person who has been trained, or who has trained himself, in a particular theory of painting, becomes so intolerant that every other theory seems to him preposterous, and he has no patience with, nor belief in, any aim that differs from his own. This condition of mind is a misfortune to an artist, because it limits his appreciation to his own work and that of his special clique, whereas his perceptive powers should be so sensitive and so widely cultivated that he can say with Keats, "I have loved the principle of beauty in all things."

Watercolor Painting - a Book of Elementary Instruction, by Grace Barton Allen ~1898

Silk Aquatint: Reflecting

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Del Pesco) — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 02:10:00 +0000

Reflecting 5.25x4.5 Silk Aquatint on BFK Rives paper, with colored pencil

Process shots begin at the bottom of this post

I've been intrigued with the soft, gradient effects of aquatint in etching for awhile now, but the supplies needed are pretty specific and a bit too toxic for me to have in my home studio (check out this video from Crown Point Press to see how it's done). A few years ago, I read about silk aquatints online. The idea that I could get a gradient plate tone, and a painterly print, with water soluble materials (no acid) really rings my bell! So, I've researched all the variables, and I'm experimenting with the process. I'll be posting the results here.

Here's my little print, Reflecting, fresh off the drawing table, with a couple of layers of colored pencil over the Akua Intaglio ink to bring out the details I lost in the printing process of my first Silk Aquatint. It's available on Etsy.

A bum print always has potential to become something with a little artistic assistance. The next day, the Akua inks had dried completely, and I wanted to see how they handled colored pencil. I love the way prismacolor pigment sticks to the oil based inks I've used - especially Daniel Smith and Graphic Chemical. My experiences with other manufacturer's water soluble inks as a base for colored pencil haven't worked so well, so I was really surprised to find that the colored pencil adheres to the Akua Intaglio inks perfectly!

I didn't get any of the subtle gradation I was hoping for in the print, and I suspect there were two reasons: the shimmery fabric was very absorbent when I was painting with the white ink/gel. I re-applied the white paint three times, and it eventually sunk into the fabric after each pass, leaving the weave exposed to catch ink. I also think my ratio of gel to white paint was off. I painted and pulled two prints during this session (I'll post the other one next) and they both had the same fabric and the same issue; lost details, even after heavy wiping in the white areas. Back to the drawing board. I have a different fabric over mat board to try, as well as that same fabric over a plexiglass sheet, so there will be lots of experiments this week.

Here is my inked and wiped plate on the press bed, with a little tape registration to center my paper over the plate.

I also tried my new batch of Akua wiping fabric. It's much softer than traditional stiff tarlatan, and it works great on their inks.

After the plate was dry, I trimmed the excess fabric and painted a little face with a mixture of white acrylic and gel medium. The white gel/paint fills the tiny weave of the polyester, and blocks ink from settling there, so after you ink & wipe the plate and print it, what you see is what you get. I tore my paper down to size, and used Akua Intaglio Paynes Gray and a little transparent base to ink the plate with scrap mat board cards.

The instructions I found for making a silk aquatint were on the Akua web site. I don't have access to silkscreen polyester locally, so I stopped at a fabric store and bought two types of polyester silk organza; one is shimmery and a little slick, and the other was rougher to the touch and seemed to have a bit more ink-holding tooth. The instructions advise against using cardboard as a base for the plate because it's too absorbent, so I used mat board coated with a thin layer of gel medium as a seal. In the photo above, I'm using a foam applicator brush to paint a layer of watered down black acrylic on top of the silk to adhere it to the plate. It would be wise to iron the silk, but I was intrigued by the possibility of inky effects from the ridges of the fabric. The plate in the lower right has the shimmery silk, and it's the one I used for the art in this post - Reflecting. You can already see the way each fabric reacted differently to the coat of black... both were wet in the photo, but the polyester on the plate in the upper right corner seems to sit on top of the paint. I haven't used that one yet, but I'm looking forward to it.

Art Quote

The beautiful "In sorrow" painting has a story worth telling in its own right. Zorn's self confidence was expanding, more now than ever before, mainly due to his successes in watercolours, though his love for Emma Lamm played no lesser role.

His artistic breakthrough took place in the spring of 1880. His painting "In Sorrow" was chosen as the main piece at the Academy's exhibition. The model for the painting was Mimmi Nystrand, whose father had just passed away (at the time Zorn was living with the family.) Zorn said, regarding the reception of the piece:

"I painted the head of a young woman, wearing a black veil, and called it 'In Sorrow' before submitting it the pupil's show. Professor Boklund, the bitter but benevolent man in charge of the exhibition, had a toothache that day and saw me with half-hearted enthusiasm. He said about my painting: "Son, such waste of paper. Put it down on the floor!" ...

... "The next day however, I was sent after to meet him, and he said: "Son, they want it! They're crazy about it! How much do you want for it?" Staggered by this unexpected turn, I modestly replied "Fifty kronor" (about half a dollar) - "Son, damn you for not asking one hundred and fifty for it! The next day the caretaker came to me with an envelope containing one hundred and fifty kronor. It was from one of the professors who bought it for a friend. A few days later there was a big article in the magazine describing my opus, and how my fortune was made."

Introduction to Anders Zorn by Matt Viinanen

Silk Aquatint: Cat in the Lap

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Del Pesco) — Sat, 14 Jan 2012 23:27:00 +0000

Cat in the Lap - 6.75 x 5.5 Silk Aquatint with Colored Pencil
Available on Etsy
This aquatint was made the same day as the previous post (Reflecting), with the same materials, and I got the same result. I reworked the print with some colored pencil (see before & after below) and prepped new plates (using mat board and plexiglass as a base), so I'm looking forward to the results of my next aquatint experiments.

Fixing the print; after the ink dried, I added colored pencil to enhance the details I lost in the printmaking process.

Pulling the print on the press bed; As you can see above, I lost a lot of details, just like the first plate I pulled earlier that day, but I have some ideas for adjustments in the next batch of silk aquatints, and I'm hopeful for better results.

These hiccups are one of the great things about art, because they push my brain out of the comfortable and familiar zone, and challenge me to think through problem solving. Getting comfortable in art-making can be seductive, whether it's in the rendering of a subject, or the process used to create the art. Its probably a bit more relaxing to approach it that way, but I find it more stimulating to keep trying new things, and with each failure, my commitment to practice my craft gets a shot of conviction and resolve to think it through, and try again. And then there's the reward of a big hooray and a studio happy dance when repeated attempts finally come to fruition. :)

Inking the plate with a scrap of mat board and my groovy new Akua Intaglio ink (Paynes Gray) and Transparent Medium.

After sealing a scrap of mat board with acrylic gel, I laid a piece of polyester mesh/silk on the plate, and adhered the fabric to the plate with with a diluted mix of black acrylic pain. After that dried, I painted an image with white acrylic paint and acrylic gel mixed in a 1 to 5 ratio. The instructions for the process can be found on the Akua Inks web site.If you try this printmaking method, please share your results in the comments section. I'd love to see what you came up with!

Art Quote
If the face were an entirely flat surface, in which the features occasioned neither projections nor depressions, nothing more would be necessary in painting a representation of it, than to cover it with a uniform flat tint of flesh color. But as there is scarcely any part of it which is perfectly flat, the gradations of light and shade claim the earnest attention of the student, and are, perhaps, best learned from a plaster cast, where they are separated from color. (It is a good plan always to keep a white bust at hand as a guide to light and shadow.)

Practical Directions for Portrait Painting in Watercolor ~ by Mrs. Merrifield 1850

Monotype: Winter Refuge

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Del Pesco) — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 16:55:00 +0000

Winter Refuge 8x10 Monotype with colored pencil

Sold

Process images begin at the bottom of this post

This was an anniversary gift from husband to wife. While describing the art he wanted to present to his beloved, my client referred to his wife as extra special and he said that she loves to read and garden, and that she is a great Mom to their son. The birdbath fountain is a nod towards their little family of three, with an angel statue watching over them. The reader is settled comfortably in a big chair, surrounded by abundant blooms on a winter day, enjoying a good book, safe in the refuge of a greenhouse.

The monotype, while I was adding colored pencil to flesh out some of the details.

One of the best things about using Akua is the clean up; Green Works wipes (no thinner or turpentine) clean the ink off the plate and my work surface instantly. I'm really loving this product; great pigments, non-drying until they get pressed to your paper, non toxic, no fumes and easy clean up.

A soaked and blotted sheet of Rives BFK paper was laid over the plate, and rolled under the press. In this photo, I'm pulling the print from the plate, and you can see how well the Akua Kolor releases from the surface of the lexan plate.

Laying the plate on the press bed, ready to print.

I used Akua Kolor inks on a lexan plate for this monotype.

The preliminary sketch of a reader in a greenhouse, near a birdbath fountain.

Art Quote
Raphael (1483-1520) re-entered the coterie of artists and patricians which assembled at leisure hours in the house of Baccio d'Agnolo, the architect who was then supervising so many new buildings. Here [in his early 20's] he met Sansovino, Lippi, Cronaca, Majani, Granacci, the San Galli and the great [Michael] Angelo, and listened with deep interest to their discussions about the principles of art. Through his intimacy with certain wealthy merchants and nobles, he secured several orders for portraits - the best of which were those of the art patron Angelo Doni and Maddalena his wife. These are now in the Pitti Palace, and show warm coloring and careful finish combined with poor drawing and timid execution. Raphael next painted the celebrated Madonna del Cardellino, or Virgin of the Goldfinch, as a wedding present for his friend Nasi, a frequenter of Agnolo's symposia. The Virgin is shown as seated in a graceful landscape looking with unspeakable tenderness at the infant Jesus who is about to caress a goldfinch held by St John. This picture was sacredly preserved until the fall of the Nasi Palace in 1547, when it was broken in pieces. Carefully repaired and restored, it now forms one of the chief ornaments of the Uffizi Tribune.

Artist Biographies: Raphael, Leonardo Da Vinci and Michael Angelo, by Moses Foster Sweetster 1878

Silk Aquatint: The Captain's Cabin

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Del Pesco) — Sat, 21 Jan 2012 01:30:00 +0000

The Captain's Cabin 7.75x7.75 Silk Aquatint & colored pencil

Available on Etsy.

I'm starting to learn what works best for me with Silk Aquatint Printmaking. The work in process shots and details of what I've learned begin at the bottom of this post. The reference photo for this little aquatint was snapped at a wonderful B&B called the Inn at Bath, in Bath, Maine.

Rinsing the plate after scrubbing with Dawn soap. [NOTE: If you're using mat board as your plate, and you haven't sealed it first - front, back & all four edges - with Acrylic Medium before building the plate, don't run it under water, or you'll turn it into a sponge. Before I adhered the polyester screen to this mat board, I coated the entire surface with Acrylic Medium to seal it. The Akua ink Silk Aquatint instructions suggest avoiding cardboard as a plate, because it's too absorbent. I have a lot of scrap mat board from framing my work, so I'm blocking the absorbency with acrylic gel as the first step to preparing the plates.]

The fine folks at Takach press gave me a good tip: when cleaning Akua Waterbased Inks from plates, hands or work surfaces, straight Dawn dish soap (no water) works fast. I used more than I needed here to illustrate the point, but a dime sized dollop and a scrub brush or old rag works great to clean all the ink from the polyester screen on my plate.

After a trip through the press, I'm pulling the print, and you can see the variations in tone and value - from rich darks, to brighter passages, and some nice gradations in between. I think I'm going to have a lot of fun with this easy to build, non toxic printmaking method.

On the press bed, with a soaked & blotted piece of BFK Rives paper, ready to print.

Here, I've inked & wiped the plate, intaglio style, with a blend of Akua Intaglio water based ink in Paynes Gray, cut 50/50 with Akua Transparent Base.

Using white acrylic paint, blended with either acrylic gel (for thicker application) or acrylic medium (for thinner application), I painted this little interior and let it dry completely.

The photo above shows a new batch of silk aquatint plates under way. The plates are all scrap mat board, coated first with a thin layer on all sides & edges with Acrylic Gel. This step shows polyester cut about an inch larger than each plate, and laid on the surface. Using a foam applicator brush, I spread a layer of black acrylic paint, thinned 1/5 with water on each square of polyester so it would adhere to the plate with no air bubbles or wrinkles. I let these dry over night, and trimmed the excess fabric the next morning. For step by step instructions, visit the Akua web site, and/or see the description below.

Art Quote

To prepare a silk aquatint plate, you will need a substrate or backing board, some black and some white acrylic paint and fabric. Caraccio prefers to use high impact polystyrene because it comes in large sheets, has the thickness of a zinc plate and cuts easily, even curved shapes with just a mat knife. Other choices are Plexiglas, rigid wood or metal. Avoid cardboard as it is too soft and absorbent. For black paint, use any kind, even inexpensive house paint as long as it is acrylic. The acrylic white paint should be artist's quality. Acrylic medium or gel are needed too, but do not use gesso or modeling paste as they both have a sandy texture. For a brush to make the plate, use a sponge brush if possible. For the image making, some artists use trowels, spatulas and squeegees as well as painting brushes. Caraccio's favorite fabric is silk screening polyester 12xx or 14xx. Real silk organdy will work as well; other fabrics can be experimented with. Wrinkles are a potential problem. Roll the fabric and do not let it touch the floor to avoid dust.
First, sand the backing material lightly to give it tooth. Next, clean the board of all dust with water and a rag and let dry. The black paint is then applied to the board after first thinning it to the consistency of light cream. If you are getting obvious brush strokes, thin the paint even more. After the black is dry, inspect the surface for any lumps and remove them. Next cut your fabric on the bias and cut the fabric larger than the backing by one half inch. The bias cut prevents fraying around the edges. Lay the fabric over the painted backing. It is helpful for the next step to lay your backing plate on a surface into which tacks or pushpins can be used. Tack around the edges only if there are wrinkles to be pulled out. Now with a brush, flood paint the fabric with more black paint. Make this a fluid application to drench the pores of the weave. This colors the silk and adheres it to the backing. Let dry completely, about three hours.
Now prepare the white paint by mixing 1/5 acrylic white paint with 4/5 acrylic medium (for smooth coating) or gel (for impasto effect). Now begin to make your image. If you do not wish to see brush strokes in the print, water down the white paint and use more layers (letting the paint dry before adding to the layers). You can wet the silk for water color effects. Let your plate dry and trim the edges. Ink with a square of cardboard or plastic ink spreader. Wipe the plate with tarlatan & print.
~ Maryland Printmakers InPrint article, Sue Anne Bottomley visits the New York City studio of Kathy Caraccio, March 1998