skull problem

I've been having a bit of trouble with my skull prints... They're etchings, and to print etchings the paper must be soaked. But paper, when soaked tends to stretch and shrink, which, to my dismay, doesn't go well at all with the precise measurements associated with concertina books...


So after spending the morning printing 5 strips of eight plates I found the next day they were about 2cm shorter and the pages wouldn't line up at all. That's the way to learn I suppose, it seems to be the way I'm learning at the moment at least... So. Onto plan B.


Individual sewn pages?
On a concertina spine?
French folded?

I wish there were more hours in the day!

saturday

2 magpies, 2 wood pigeons, 2 robins, a sparrow, a great tit, a squirel. And no pictures because I was too busy digging. Too busy digging up a couple of years worth of accumulated leaves, weeds, grassy tufts, worms, stones, roots, and tiny (and not so tiny) sycamore trees. And underneath it all I found a patio...

Beautiful sunny day. Cold but sunny. Makes me remember I'm alive.

Wedding albums in time for valentines day...


I hope their happy memories will be safe inside!

work in progress

It's half term this week which means I finished work at half four instead of half eight, and for the first time this year I left work in the day light, a thing to be celebrated! It's still light as I type this and it feels like such a liberation, the birds are singing, I survived winter again...

And I've been working on some etchings; skulls I drew after my visit to the Natural History Museum. There's something about them all lined up in cases; categorised, classified. What is it that appeals to me? Diagrammed and named, no flesh.

Below is a proof of the etched plates, pieces of copper 6cm square, just the lines...


And with the aquatint solution sprayed across the surface, stopped out with acrylic paint, ready to etch...


Another proof, this time after the aquatint. So far so good.


I'm planning to make a little concertina book with these prints, with a slip case to contain it. Tomorrow.

on my desk

trees.

.

I'm very good at procrastinating. I'm very good at thinking about baking a clementine cake when I should be making books.

Lit the fire. Washed up. Recognised the merits of learning to crochet. Felt sorry for myself, picked bits of ash off the rug. Got out pencil, paper, rubber, 3 different thicknesses of pen. And number of books made? none.

Right.

a moon book

Whilst I was playing around with my moon screen print I printed some of the final layer in white onto some recycled card that I had been saving for who knows what (like you do). It's a lovely soft brown colour with little flecks of colour through out; reminders of its colourful past I suppose.


Anyway, I decided to make the prints into book covers with the moon wrapping right around the book and across the spine...


I'm really pleased with this little book, the subtlety of the white on speckled brown is hard the photograph (these are the third attempt!) but it works well. The folded edges make it sturdy and durable. The moon appears in the light. It feels nice in my hand.

You can see more here...