Collagraph: First Swim

First Swim 7x7 Collagraph printed with Akua Intaglio ink
on Johannot paper, with colored pencil

Available in my Etsy Shop.
Sold
Thanks to CE for letting me use her lovely photo as a reference for this piece.
In the last post, I was marveling about the art & riding a wave of inspiration from re-reading Alice Carter's fabulous book, The Red Rose Girls. I'm still reading, and swooning over the imagery. I've got a stack of scrap mat board, a scribbled list of ideas for collagraphs, and it's a new year in a clean(ish) studio. If I work fast at the onset of an inspiration-avalanche, I get a lot done. Too much noodling and planning dulls the excitement with a false sense of accomplishment; no gold stars for fantasizing about gathering supplies & how I'll make the art next week. It's better to grab stuff and produce the art now, and while that one is drying, make another one - with time scheduled exclusively for that. That's my motto for the year: Make Something. What's yours?

Collagraph prints drying in the studio

Pulling the collagraph

After going through the press, the relief surface
of the plate is visible in the paper

Wiping the uppermost layer of the plate with newsprint.

Using à la poupée, I'm daubing Akua Intaglio inks with
rolled and taped scraps of felt,  and applying color to particular
areas of the plate, being deliberate to push ink
into the cut out recesses and curbs of my line work.

I've wet the area of her hair with Liquitex Gloss Medium Varnish
and sifted some #120 grit carborundum into the space to hold ink later.

After drawing on the mat board, I'm cutting and peeling
the top layer away to hold ink.

 Art Quote
One night, Alberto (Giacometti) found himself late at the Cafe de Flore.  Most of the other customers had left, but at an adjacent table sat a man alone. Presently he leaned toward Alberto and said, "Pardon me but I've often seen you here, and I think we're the sort of people who understand each other. I happen to have no money on me. Would you mind paying for my drink?" That was the kind of request Alberto could never have refused. He promptly paid for the stranger's drink. A conversation ensued, and it did seem that the two men were the sort of people who understood each other. Twenty-five years later, it would be worth recalling that their friendship had begun with such an optimistic assumption. The man was Jean-Paul Sartre.
James Lord, Giacometti: A Biography

Thanks for stopping by!
Belinda