Solar Plates

This Photo Transfer class I'm taking at the Pacific Art League, taught by Julia Nelson-Gal yesterday was really good. Thankfully, Julia was sympathetic to me not being there next week, so she shifted the things we will do around a bit. Instead of doing the xerox transfer, we did solar plates. We took our own photos and Julia first walked us step-by-step through the modifications needed to make a solar plate in Photoshop. Everyone had their laptop there and we all worked the steps together. That was fun and you know how I love Photoshop, so learning that set of skills was important.

Then, we printed our photos onto this stuff that looks like a transparency, but is a special material with emulsion on one side called Pictorico. You take that little image and trim it down to the plate size (we did 5x7s) and then go into a semi-darkroom. In there, Julia had this box she'd made with UV lights. You put the transparency on the plate which also has this emulsion stuff on it - a plastic layer that is light sensitive - and you expose it, like you would do a photo in a real darkroom. Once that plate has been exposed, which only takes about 90 sec, then you put it in water and rinse and gently brush the surface with a mushroom cleaning brush. The plastic that was not exposed rinses off, leaving this barely visible image of divits in the areas where your image was exposed. Those divits are where the ink will take later. Some of us with darker areas on our photos used an aquatint screen to lay in a very very slight (not visible to the naked eye) layer of dots that prevents the darker areas from "biting."

We had some challenges with what side had emulsion on it, but we figured it out. Then we went back upstairs to the print room and printed our plates. You take the same sort of ink we've been using at Aurobora, and mix it a little differently for what is basically etching. Julia showed us how the ink is supposed to look as far as the flow of the ink on the mix knife. You use a little hard plastic scraperto scrape in back and forth over the plate. Ink goes down into the tiny little places where the plastic was burned out and then you wipe the plate with that stiff tarletan (think stiff cheesecloth). I don't think cheesecloth would work here, unless its been stiffened by use with ink. All this has to be done carefully so as not to scratch that plastic plate, though the UV light has hardened it somewhat, but it is like any other plate - a heavy material or an accidental brush up against something sharp will leave a mark.

Here's my transparency:


Here's my solar plate:


And here's my final print:

Art with Seniors

I am volunteering to do art with seniors at a local senior daycare center. I have taught art classes with children in the past - at elementary school level in a program modeled after FAME, and also at the Hayward Area Park and Recreation District's Ashland Community Center. These prior experiences facilitating art-making were so enriching to me - seeing the amazing art kids will make and being in the midst of their enthusiasm too, which is infectious.

I had gone to the senior center a couple of weeks ago, just to meet the people, and see the area where we would be working. They are a delightful group of men and women who come to this facility from 10-2 daily to visit, have lunch, and do various activities. I realized after visiting with them, that art projects I'd done with the kids were probably going to require some modification. These seniors have varying levels of mobility, fine motor control, and some have mild demensia. So, I chose to have them make butterflies. I wanted a project that had some structure to it, was easy to do in less than the hour we had for the activity and that would have them take something home with them.

We used No. 4 coffee filters which I had cut notches out of to paint on and make the wings of butterflies using tempera paint. Some of the participants decided using two filters on each project would look good, and the results were some luscious insects. The filters were scrunched in the middle and hot glued to a clothespin I had spray painted black before class. We hot glued on some pipe cleaners for antennae too. Click in on the collaged image to see better detail.

Lots of fun! Here they all are with their creations.

Aurobora Workshop #3

Another great workshop at Aurobora over the weekend. We watched people streaming by to see the Giants play the Phillies, while munching on a beautiful ham quiche and a birthday brownie cake for one of the workshop participants. I continued to refine my xerox transfer technique, which I will post photos of tomorrow.

I started workshop #3 with the intent to spend the first day doing "warm ups." I was thinking about how we warm up to sing, play the piano, run, etc. but we don't really allow ourselves art warm up time. Instead, the pressure is on to create a masterpiece from the get go.

In printmaking and especially monotypes, there is even more pressure to create that amazing piece, and there is a lot of thought that really should go in to planning and executing the piece, especially if there are multiple layers to be pulled on the press. So, I worked on color, general composition and some technique for the first part of Day #1.

Here are some of the results:

Continuing Work with the Xerox Transfer Process

Trinity College

Monotype on Arches, Mixed Media
Paper Size 26"x30"
Image Size 14"x17"

Here are more prints using the xerox transfer. I am really enjoying being able to take photos I've taken that were inspiring, but not so useful to me as I am not truly a photographer, and putting them to work in the mediums I love.

This xerox transfer is especially nice for high contrast photos. I like taking photos of power poles, electrical and other process equipment, and trees.

Guide Meridian
Monotype
Rives Cream Paper
Paper Size 22"x26"
Image Size 11"x17"

And you may notice that I added a little something to Tank 302, in the upper right corner.

Tank 302
Monotype on Vellum, Mixed Media
Paper Size 30"x24"
Image Size 14"x17"

Okay - This is Starting to Get Really Fun

Amenophis I
Monotype, Mixed Media
Canson Gray
Paper Size 12.5" x 20"

I've been agonizing for a week now about what to do to finish these two prints I did last weekend at Aurobora. I was so happy with use of the contrasting paper, the pages from the Ancient Mythology book and use of the gelatin print I had made of peony leaves while in MN (see below, ghost print from plate with peony chine colle). As nice as they were, though, I felt the pieces needed something black in a line drawing that related to ancient mythology.

The text of the book pages (see above, Amenophis I) relates to the pharoh Amenophis, so I found an image of clay pottery from his tomb (courtesy of google images!) and drew it in pencil. I did the xerox transfer method with some black-gray ink and voila!

They both now feel complete.

Amenophis IV
Monotype, Mixed Media
Canson Gray
Paper Size 12.5" x 20"

Two Days Off

It was a bit painful, I'll admit, to now have two days I couldn't work in my studio. I had meetings in San Francisco and helping a friend pack to move. All of these were delightful activities, and I yearned to be here working on the press too. I was able to do a little bit in the evenings, mostly thinking about and reading on how to finish up this piece. I am referring myself to Places and Spaces by Gaston Bachelard. Specifically, the final chapter which is on the phenomenology of round/sphere.

My engineering schooling didn't include classes in philosophy, wherein I might have been more exposed to the meaning of round and it's relation to our essential being. Reading about this makes my head hurt - a little like when Clinton was parsing "It depends on what the meaning of the word is is," though this work is entirely different subject matter.

A bit of explanation about the process: It started with a line drawing of two enmeshed gears that I found on-line in 2007. I had just taken the first print class at Aurobora and wanted to learn how to transfer simple line drawings to paper. We never got to it in that class and the written instructions given to me were daunting, so I never went back to it. Then, it was demonstrated in class last weekend using this drawing. Deb made one print onto nice paper, and a second onto the graph paper I brought that had another small print of a sphere on it. I chine colle'd those onto vellum, following the example of Delacroix, who made this beautiful chine colle onto vellum from a drawing he had done in 1828. I thought the vellum would be a nice choice of base papers given the subject matter of gears.


I used the plate I found at Aurobora that has the tape in an arc to lay in turquoise and green opposing arcs that gently formed a circle and then used xerox transfer to put an image of a tank from the refinery that I took a few weeks ago (Tank 302). I added some color to the xerox transfer and reprinted it, then added an overall background color of the reds and pinks.

Tank 302
Monotype on Vellum, Mixed Media
Paper size 30"x24"

Here is a detail shot:

Post-Production Work on Prints Continues

Valentine's Day Girls

Valentine's Day Friends
11x14
Monotype

This print is based on an image I did in Photoshop on Valentine's Day 2009. I worked up the backgound at Aurobora over the weekend using a selection of textures to mimic the Photoshop stamps I used in the original. This monotype has the largest xerox transfer I've done so far, the two girls side by side in dark teal.

Here's the Photoshop version:



With this print, I tried the idea I mentioned yesterday of putting the clean transparency sheet underneath the xerox transfer before prepping it (wiping ink off with the sponge). One thing I didn't plan for was that when you wipe the transfer to remove excess ink, it will immediately stick to anything that wasn't first coated with the gum arabic. So, it smeared all over the sides of the image, on the part of the transparency that wasn't covered by paper.

The idea was that the paper would be nicely held in the safety of the transparency with some border to allow me to cleanly pick it up, but just the opposite happened - the ink on that part of the transparency was a mess. It got all over my hands and then that is a recipe for disaster when you move to the original print with it's nice tidy white border. One little speck of ink there and it's all over. So - scratch that idea. I'll just prep the xerox transfer, go wash my hands or deglove, and then transfer the paper to a nice clean rigid plate that gives me the control I need to move the image to the print. The nice thing is that all that water in the process helps the paper stick to the transparency, plate, etc. Water is my friend. I also found that I really need to make sure the receiving paper is dampened, and that there isn't an excess of ink on the transfer.

Those darker areas of the skirts had too much ink built up and the paper of the original transfer stuck to the print. I was able to use a razor blade edge to pick it up and tear it off (like a price tag off a plate or glass), but it could have been a disaster under different circumstances. I added a rose that I had printed on vellum to the upper right corner using gel medium and the press to lock it in place. The press is better than any stack of books for getting something really glued down. I'm happy with this print.

More Analysis of Ancient Mythology

These three prints were a series with no further work after Sunday. I used a found plate at Aurobora that had some tape stuck to it in an arc. For the first print, I used chine colle to put down a section from a gelatin print I'd done in MN a couple of weeks ago with a map from that Analysis of Ancient Mythology book. The plate was painted and I think I created what for me is a better technique for getting a nice thin layer of ink on the plate evenly. I used a brush with some Olivera oil in the ink to thin it a bit. Brush over the plate just like doing a painting. Cover evenly. Then, use the brayer to really even it out. This works better for me than the brayer with ink directly to the plate because I can't seem to get a nice even layer with the brayer without it being thicker. I'm learning to lighten up on the brayer which also helps.

The ghost image and a second print with more paper from the MN project were done on the second and third prints. I have one more series of three prints that are in a skin/flesh tone to finish up. I probably won't get to those until late nights the rest of this week, or Saturday.

Ancient Mythology No. 1
15x17
Monotype

Ancient Mythology No. 2
15x17
Monotype

Ancient Mythology No. 3
15x17
Monotype

More Xerox Transfer Skillage

I'm continuing to work with the xerox transfer method on my prints. On these, I did a base print of flowers painted on the plate, trying to recreate the feel from this February Photoshop piece (eg, be inspired by...):


I printed out some of the same flowers using Photoshop brushes, onto a separate sheet of clean 11x17 paper, just in black and white. I used the gum arabic to protect the image and get it ready to suck up the ink. I mixed inks to complement those I used in the studio over the weekend on my nice glass plate. (Have I mentioned lately how much I love my home studio? Everything right at my fingertips. Aaahhhhh). I didn't have Daniel Smith quinacridone red, so I tried to match as closely as possible the blue and pink, but they are different hues than what we worked with at Aurobora. That's okay. I think the slight difference accidentally adds more to the piece. The inks I mixed yesterday are more purple than blue, and more coral than pink. I printed a couple of times with the flowers as a xerox transfer onto the print itself and then printed the residual inks left on the xerox transfer onto a piece of heavier art paper. Then, I cut out a couple of those flowers from the art paper and added them to the print using the chine colle method, with a light layer of ink over half of the print. I added the eye with the xerox transfer method, separately.

This set of transfers went really well - I am just about over getting any ghosting of the ink around the image by carefully applying ink with either a brush or brayer. The brayer does seem to be better at "pushing" the ink down into the grooves of the image and the sponge removal is going well. I was careful to lightly keep brushing the sponge over the transfer to remove all the little boogers of ink that seem to ball up. In bed last night (while dreaming?) I thought of an improvement: I've been putting the paper with the image down right onto my work table which has a large piece of plexiglass on it as a protection over the zinc top. This works well in that the water on the paper while I'm sponging it holds the image firmly in place on the tabletop, but then when I go to lift the paper to move it to the print, it can sometimes tear because the paper is so wet and delicate from having been brushed quite a bit with the sponge.

So, last night I thought I could position a transparency under the image first. I have a bunch of those, because now with Powerpoint, we don't use transparencies and overhead projectors. I could then just move the transparency to my print on the press bed, being careful to line up any edges - even the smallest thickness of the transparency can create a line on the print, depending on how I put it through the press. Also, I think I will use a clean plexi plate over the top of the whole print area with the clean newsprint paper as padding, just to keep things neat and clean when running it through the press.

Here are the two prints then, from last night. They were originally titled "Freebyrd." I'll call them Freebyrd 2 and Freebyrd 3.

Freebyrd 2
11x14
Monotype on Arches Paper


Freebyrd 3

11x14
Monotype on Arches Paper

Printing Workshop - Weekend #2

Wow - what a great workshop this weekend at Aurobora Press. This was the second of five weekend workshops between June and October with Master Printer Deb Sibony. My goal in the work this weekend was to take pieces I had made in Photoshop back in February and recreate them as prints. The Photoshop process is, to me, the electronic equivalent of printmaking. I can take layers in Photoshop and fiddle with the opacity and put them under and over other layers and images.

This is the image I made in February, called K-Bessel Function in Terms of the Confluent Hypergeometric Function:


I am elated to have finally learned chine colle and the xerox transfer method of transferring images to the paper. I worked with pages from an old book called Analysis of Ancient Mythology that was published in 1807 - yes 202 years ago! The book was published in quarto style, meaning that four pages, front and back, were printed at one time, then folded to make a quarto. Twenty-seven of these quartos made up the entire book (27x4 pages). Interestingly, the copy I purchased did not have the tops of the pages split, so the book was unreadable. I unbound the book and spread the pages out to make beautiful, printed on paper which I will use for art.

Some of these I used today for chine colle to the paper. I'll post photos of that work tomorrow, when the light is better.

For now, here is a print I made using the xerox transfer method. We also found the cafe that serves the fabulous turkey sandwiches with cranberry sauce called HRD Coffee Shop. The cafe has been there for 47 years and takes its name from Human Resource Development because it was across the street from the Social Security Administration offices at one time and was where anyone who needed to get back into the workforce was directed.

I went to a lecture last night at the Palo Alto Art Center. The speakers were from the Djerassi Art Residency in Palo Alto. The first speaker, Michael David White, was a poet who spoke a little bit about his process and read three of his poems.

The second artist was Glynnis Reed. Glynnis makes photoshopped collages about love and nature. This was really interesting to see her use of layering and use of the tablet (Wacom) in her work.

The third speaker I enjoyed the most - Loren Schwerd. Loren is a sculptural artist who has created these small replicas of houses hit by Hurricane Katrina that are overlaid with human hair woven as the walls, roof, etc. Sounds funky, but it was very powerful work, especially to hear her process explained.

Artsy Photos from Day in Victoria

We traveled from Belllingham to Victoria BC and back today. Many great photo opps. Here are some of my favorites. The rest can be viewed on my Picasa Web Albums. Enjoy!

Pearson's St Paul MN

I took this photo while toodling around MSP the other day (6/30). Thank you again to Laurie for the generous loan of her vehicle. I was on my way to the Walker Art Museum to do some self-induced Art-O-Mancy*, and went down the Lexington Parkway the wrong way. This move put me on the very south side of Minneapolis, so I got to travel all the way north on Nicollet, which was interesting. When I found myself at the Bad Waitress, I was no longer lost.

Many a good meal at the Bad Waitress while at the MCAD WAI program two years ago. It is such a hoot to see all this '60's era decor, but the place is very neat and clean. Service is irreverant, though.

Anyway, I snapped this photo of the railroad, a paper company (I think) and the Pearson factory. Turns out it was Pearson's Candy Company. They make peppermint patties, nut goodies, salted nut rolls. Kinda old fashioned candy, but I'm sure it is good!
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* Art-O-Mancy: Devised by Laurie Phillips, it is a game where you ask yourself a question like: What is the next direction my art should take? or What is my next career?

You are blindfolded (usually) and with a guide who helps you keep from running into something. You are in a museum, with a copy of the museum's program/floor plan open in front of you. As you ponder this question, you put your finger down on the museum plan. The piece of art at the location of your finger has the answers to your question. You go there (take off blindfold first, please) and view the art, seeking clues to your question. Journal, as appropriate.

Just a Photo

Not really art I did today, but a photo will have to do. I'm in the midst of planning some vacations. Whew - who knew that vacationing could be so exhausting! Here's a photo of the Royal Couple - Queen Aurora and King George Randall Peeve III - lounging on the royal bed.

Back Home

I don't have any of my own pictures for a postcard today. I took some with my camera, but just got home and it is very late, so I will have to download them tomorrow. I was joking with my hosts in MN that I really didn't feel I could leave MN until the whole Franken/Coleman situation was settled. Today, the Minnesota Supreme Court upheld a lower court ruling that votes cast for Franken in the November election were counted fairly. Norm Coleman conceded and it is likely that Franken will be sworn in after the 4th of July, finally able to start serving his constituency, only seven months after being elected. The news all day in Minneapolis said this was a relatively swift proceeding, given that it went all the way up to the state Supreme Court. Anyway, felt good to know that was in the bag before I left tonight.

More Art...It Just Never Stops in Minneapolis/St. Paul

I had dinner tonight with a dear friend from the Minneapolis College of Art & Design's Women's Art Institute that we both attended in 2007. Carolyn Halliday is a fiber artist and had so many good reports about shows she is in, and shows and grants for which she is applying. What an inspiration.

We met at the Minnesota Textile Center - a national center for fiber art. What a great resource this is for fiber artists everywhere. Wonderful library, training rooms, and a lot of knowledge of knitting, weaving, dyeing, sewing, stitching, quilting, embroidery....the list goes on. I've never seen anything quite like it.

Carolyn toured me through the facility and then we saw the current show - she won Best In with her pieces entitled Aphrodite's Dilemma. Carolyn knits with metal. Her sacred forest of trees at the WAI critiques in 2007 was one of my favorites.


Here is her current work from the Textile Center show:


Side tech note: I didn't have the Sacred Forest photo on my laptop that's with me here in MN, but did have it in my iPhoto library on my home iMac. I went to Finder on the laptop, ported in to my home computer via "Share Screen," found the photo in the iPhoto library and clicked on "email." The home computer went into my email program on that unit and allowed me to enter my own email as an addressee, then sent it. It then showed up in my email box on my laptop thanks to the wonders of MobileMe. Gotta love Apple for this remote in capability. Note to all: I had to set up these permissions before I left home to allow screen sharing. I could probably click into the camera on that computer via PhotoBooth, if I wanted to see what is going on in my home garage/studio. But that might be a little creepy....

Gelatin Print Making

What a treat! Today we went to the Minnesota Center for Book Arts (MCBA) for a private class with Lin Lacy.

Laurie has a permanently installed piece of public art at MCBA:


And so does Lin:

Here's Lin getting us ready to start:

Lin made us a beautiful breakfast, in itself a work of art, and showed us her newly remodeled home with spacious grounds and a magical lilac tree that I can only dream of having in California (they just don't seem to grow large like that back home). She has bunnies hopping around, a bountiful garden, and a kitchen sink from the Emirates that I would love to have. Plus, a commercial dishwashing faucet that will shoot water across the entire house.

Lin made us each a gelatin plate on Saturday, so these plates were nicely set up by the time we went to use them this morning. We used brayers, found objects, mesh bags and stamps to make textures and impressions on the plates, then simply laid paper over the top of the inked plate and gently rubbed with our fingertips. The results were very satisfying.

Lin about ready to use a rubber stamp on her inked up plate:

Here are some pictures of us at the MBCA studio, and a couple of shots of work I produced. It's all good - those that didn't turn out so well as stand-on-their-own pieces will be perfect for incorporating into collages or as encaustic pieces. Thank you Lin! I'll return in the spring when we will have an encaustic class to return the favor.

Laurie in her printing apron, inking up her brayer:

Here I am inking up my gelatin plate:

A piece I did with some leaves from a tree in Laurie's yard, with a stamp overlay:

A diptych made with cardboard letters:


Another version of the leaves piece with a contrasting border:


A little detour into the type room - it was filled to the gills with typeface. Wow.