Almost done!

Hello everyone, I am back in the land of living!  I have pretty much finished my essay and we just have two weeks to go before I hand in my portfolio and that will be my first year over with.  The essay has been a marathon for me as I am just not used to writing them, but it has been fascinating too.  My subject changed three times in the process!  I ended up writing about Vija Celmins and Sol LeWitt.  Two very different artists, both fascinating.  There are many videos about both of these artists online, and some very good time lapse ones of LeWitt's accomplished 'professionals' and 'apprentices'.   I love this one.

I have also been experimenting with photo etching.  Here is my latest print.  The image came from focusing in on one of my drypoints, and enlarging a small area.  I drew the image onto drafting film with lithographic crayon and lots of charcoal and graphite.  It was then exposed onto a copper plate, which I had previously rolled with photo sensitive emulsion.  The plate is developed in Sodium Bicarbonate and warm water and hardened with UV light.  After this I put an aquatint over the whole plate, and put it in the ferric, and stopping out various areas with Brunswick varnish to create the different tones.  I have to say that the emulsion did not set properly so some of it peeled off but I decided to go with the happy accident and rather like the effect.

Photo etch 3  - 25 x 25 cm