Sandpaper Aquatint!

As few chemicals as possible.

It’s no surprise that ferric acid is hard to purchase, and dangerous to handle. Rosin powder and spray enamel to create the fine gray tones of an aquatint are far easier to obtain, and equally volatile.
Asthma + super fine rosin particles x enamel fumes = BAD NEWS
Lucky for me, and all you printmakers that don’t want to build a spinning rosin box, there is the sand paper method.



Typically, this method is used by running a hard ground coated plate with a piece of sandpaper over it through an etching press. I use transparent ball ground to save on the mess and the pocketbook, and had a feeling that it was too delicate a resist to survive the press method. Also, I do not keep ‘stop out’ solution around to block off areas I want to go un-aquatinted. What to do?
Hello bone folder! Cutting the sand paper into strips allows you to hand rub the tone you are looking for into small or large pieces of the plate. You can also cut the sand paper into curves that compliment your image. No bone folder? Use the burnishing end of your drypoint needle. The sand cuts tiny dimples into your ground that the acid will eat away at, creating a chemical free aquatint (uh, chemical free other than acid I mean). Change up the grade of sand paper to create coarse or fine shades, or pull your plates from the bath as you etch and burnish more as you go to get heavier shadow.
This is time consuming and won’t offer the super delicate gradation of rosin, nor is it as fast as spray enamel. This is best compared to using an irregular roulette. It does, however, offer minimal toxins, cost and equipment!

Talking to Myself in a Basement: Polyester plates

Talking to Myself in a Basement: Polyester plates

http://electrofork.wordpress.com/2010/06/18/polyester-plate-lithography/

Talking to Myself in a Basement: Warning, some of these chemicals can land you on a watch list.

Talking to Myself in a Basement: Warning, some of these chemicals can land you on a watch list.

http://www.instructables.com/id/Stop-using-Ferric-Chloride-etchant!--A-better-etc/

Warning, some of these chemicals can land you on a watch list.

Instructables “stop using Ferric Chloride etchant! (A better etching solution.)
Once again, I’m making a batch of acid as per the instructable websites’ recipe.

This time I used a jelly jar with measuring lines on it, because eye-balling it may have contributed to the messy bite I experienced previously.


The giant bottle of Muriatic acid I have tucked away was still all kinds of toxic fuming badness.(it is over a year old at this point)




I imagine this is what crazy purple knock out gas smells like. (if you do this at home, try not to breath)

The recipe says the etch went super quick when the acid is new. However, to achieve a proper intaglio bite, I sloshed these around in the bath for an hour or four.
Their etchant when fresh does not bite through sharpie marker typically, but it does bite messily through sharpie paint pens. This second method creates something similar to white ground, only a bit more rough. This method also turns the etching solution a disturbing black.



My thoughts; this etchant is great when it's new and slowly becomes less and less effective over time, dispite 'recharging' it. The only real problem with this stuff is having to evaporate it down to crystals to dispose of it...and even then I'm not sure know safe this is to be sent to a land fill.

Ant arthandlers sneek peak

Betsabeé Ramiro at the Neuberger museum
I want so much to post pictures of Ms. Romeros’ sprawling show at the Neuberger this month. I was lucky enough to be one of the Art Handlers called in to put the show up as well as work with the curator. Picture a high ceilinged gallery filled with gorgeous wooden crates stamped with black symbols and stacked one on top of the other.
Then we opened them.
The first object of Romero’s I set my eyes on was a carved tire with gilded tread and I said to my partner “I love it, its gilded rubbish.”
The overarching theme of this exhibition strikes me as the reclamation of beauty from broken industrial objects; cars and all their parts mostly.

Betsabeé Romero Black Tears (I can't spell it in sapanish)

Betsabeé Romero at the Neuberger museum
I want so much to post pictures of Ms. Romero’s’ sprawling show at the Neuberger this month. I was lucky enough to be one of the Art Handlers called in to put the show up as well as work with the curator. Picture a high ceilinged gallery filled with gorgeous wooden crates stamped with black symbols and stacked one on top of the other.
Then we opened them.
The first object of Romero’s I set my eyes on was a carved tire with gilded tread and I said to my partner “I love it, its gilded rubbish.”
The overarching theme of this exhibition strikes me as the reclamation of beauty from broken industrial objects; cars and all their parts mostly. You’ll be greeted by a dynamic use of found objects modified by this Mexican sculptor, from rear view mirrors laboriously decaled with stylized roses to complete cars encrusted with a mosaic blanket of broken glass, velvet and much more. Romero even recruited the visual arts student from next door to the museum to build an all new sculpture from a junked car, this one having an ocean theme.
The only drawback to this show is that there was so much we had to leave in the crates! Several giant photographs are still tucked away in their crates, longing for the loving attention of art enthusiasts. Trios of these 3’x7’ (approx.) photos are particularly interesting, showing a series of installations Romero did in Mexico City of taxi cab top embedded into the ground to reflect the original level the city once stood at. I also feel this series speaks to the migratory nature of the Mexican population, and how Mexico is very much a doorway between south/central America and the USA. This same theme of emigration is touched upon with a brick house constructed from bricks Romero had cast in distinctive molds she created.
Google her work, and you’ll know what I mean.

Polyester plates

Pronto Plates
Want lithography without the giant stone?
Tough.
A lot of people insist that polyester prints are a type of lithography, including one of my favorite teachers from undergrad. It is a cheap, fast method of creating line drawing style images in printed format. Sounds like silk screen doesn’t it?
Here’s a site I found helpful in breaking down the process. untidy revelations
You need A LOT of water for this process, and forsake grey tones. I think pronto plates are best for their original purpose, which was magazine and advertisement. As you can run these plates through a printer as well as draw directly onto it with marker of crayon, I think a funky cook book is in order.
As far as the fine art of the polyester plate, I’m not so sure that is for me.