Honestly. If I had a dollar for every time I thought I'd reach the end of a linocut in "just a couple more simple steps" I'd be a gazillionaire. This is art-making, after all, and if you are somehow still harboring the illusion that "being an artist" is all rainbows and "doing the thing you love" I am afraid I must burst that bubble for you. A lot of it is, quite simply, a slog. Or it involves a lot of hair-pulling and bashing-upon-the-table of one's forehead. Or all of the above.
At its most basic, my job is to create problems for myself and then somehow find my way out of them. Mostly I am better at creating problems than solving them. But hey. We all have our skills.
If it's not enough to confuse myself with the actual making of linocuts, I also confuse myself in my attempts to record the process. I've got a bunch of photos. Let's see if we can make any sense out of them.
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| Reduction linocut in progress: Steps... Hm. 7 and 8? Or 8 and 9? |
I have this photo, and while it obviously represents two steps, I'm not sure if they are 7 and 8... or 8 and 9. In my last post I did the spot inking for the head, beak, and breast of the bird... Step 7. That should be it at the bottom of the photo, but it seems a little dark. I might have run a layer of transparent gray over the whole bird at this point, or it might just be that the light was different in the studio that day.
Either way, the print on top represents a clear next step... and here was its roll-up:
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| Let's call this Step 8 |
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| Step 8 printed |
And here's where things got a little more.... well.... more. My original "plan" (like I ever have a plan) was to keep the bird and its reflections really close together in value and very gray in tone. But at this point I thought the whole piece would get better with "just a bit" more color. Back to spot inking! A gray-green and a red in the bird's beak and eye, and the reflections below.
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| Step 9 rollup |
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| Step 9 printed |
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| Step 10 rollup |
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| Step 10 printed |
This particular photo seems pretty true to color and value for this stage, so maybe let's stop here and take a breather. The whole piece seems so close to completion, but something is still not quite right. I predict more spot inking on the horizon.
Yes you set out your hunched. But when it comes to color. The hunch needs to be "mixed", applied to the block, lined up with previous passed, and assessed. Because it is still becoming!!! A hunch is merely a starting place. So many many many follow ups. THEN you look back at the results and make a decision. Which, if you agree with it, all the other prints of that edition must have that new color added to each of them. And NO, the artist is not a machine. 🙂🎨✍️
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DeleteHi, Sherrie--another printmaker chiming in. If it were me I'd tone down the dark reflection of the bird's neck in the water. It looks blocky to me and doesn't have the movement of the rest of the water. Maybe carve in a little wave action in the darkest part especially, or give the whole area another transparent gray instead. Or both. But this print already looks super. Love that long rectangular format.
ReplyDeleteAh well, too late for any of that! It's actually all finished... the end game coming up shortly (tomorrow). There are some more darks coming... so the darkest bits won't seem so much... maybe. :-)
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