Stones worked on from August - December 2016

I have been a bit idle on the blog front over the past few months so thought I'd share what I've been up to lately..
I have been working on some more small graining stones (approx 20 cm square) - largely because they are portable (ish!) so I can cart them home in my rucksack and work on them in my studio. I have then printed the images onto Japanese Kozo paper back at Leicester Print Workshop which I will then transfer on to small squares of pre-cast concrete back in my studio in Sheffield.
The images were largely made with dry materials (crayon/ rubbing block) and selective use of litho ink. Fine lines were achieved by scratching lines in at the second etch stage and rubbing litho ink to the incised grooves.

 

Stone (above) and printed image below

Stone above and print below

Here's the first small print I made (discussed in a previous blog) pasted with starch paste onto a small slab of pre-cast concrete and then framed to show what I am planning to do with the above prints.

I also attempted a maniere noir stone - this involves covering the stone with a thin layer of litho ink and scratching into it to expose the bare stone - a bit like a mezzotint. Tonal differences were achieved by treating the inked areas with different strengths of acid. This stone was largely experimental and not that successful as I found the fine lines that I had incised kept filling up with ink and were thus not very visible! It may have worked better if I had tried working on a bigger scale so the lines were not so fine. Here's the stone anyway so hopefully you will get the idea ...!

Finally I have been working on 2 larger stones.

The first was a quite detailed image made using masking tapes, dry materials, lithographic ink and watery tusches. Here is the finished stone:

I did have some problems with this stone as unfortunately the previous image had not been completely removed from the stone when grained and kept reappearing! I was largely able to etch these areas back but it was a bit of a nuisance and reinforced the necessity to ensure that the stone is properly grained each time!

Here is the printed image - I also printed a very pale tint on the dried print. This was done by mixing litho ink extender with a very small amount of mixed beige coloured ink, rolling it on a very thin piece of aluminium cut to slightly bigger than the image size, placing it on the lithographic print and running it through the etching press. Here is the finished print:

Lastly the final stone I have been working on is a bit less complicated and was done using masking tapes, litho ink and rubbing block. Fine lines were achieved by scratching into the stone and rubbing ink into the incised grooves at the second etch stage. Here's the stone :

and the finished image, (again a tint was placed using the same method as above by rolling ink and extender onto aluminium plate and monoprinting it onto the dried lithographic black and white print)