We went up north to see the eclipse! I got a decent-ish shot of the totality by holding a phone camera filter (which didn't work with my admittedly old phone) up in front of my real camera. While waiting, I did a watercolor sketch of the mountains and some vignettes of my fellow humans gathering for the event.
M/others Institute for Collaboration and Art presents MICAfest 2024
MICAfest 2024 Art for Change: The M/others’ View
Visual/Performing/Literary Arts
I’m a Featured Artist!
80 m/other artists
May 1-31, 2024
Northampton, MA
Tickets for MICAfest are now open!
experiencemica.org/micafest-2024-northampton-ma/
My pieces, Three Women and Sunscreen, will be on display at Bombyx Center for Arts & Equity in the Peacock Room.
Took the bike out to the abandoned golf course, which was partly flooded from recent rains, and did this sketch of ex-farm buildings, subsequently repurposed by a landscaping company. Actually the golf course is also in the process of being repurposed as a recreational area/solar farm, so may lose its wild and melancholy aspect.
Pen, inkwash, white gouache and white Sakura Gellyroll pen on toned paper.
4" x 6"
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The hydrometer is basically a closed glass tube, weighted at one end with what looks like birdshot and glue, with calibrations on a paper roll inside the tube.
Floated in plain water, it reads 0.
PCC Memories etched with 34˚ Be ferric chloride.
I don't know how much it will show up here, but it made a noticeable difference to etch with 34˚ Be ferric chloride - the lines I added were darker and sharper.
"Three Women" and "Sunscreen" have been accepted to MICAfest Art for Change: The M/others’ View, a Visual/Performing/Literary Arts Festival coming to Northampton, MA in May. It will feature performances and visual art displays exploring non-traditional definitions and narratives of "m/otherhood," and will go on throughout the month of May at various venues to be announced.
https://experiencemica.org/
This is the first proof I've gotten that looked decent enough to post. I've been tweaking the variables of the process - prepping the plate, applying the ground, inscribing the drawing, etching, inking, wiping, preparing the paper, and printing. Still pretty far from having a reliable procedure but starting to narrow it down. I'm using non-toxic, or at least less toxic materials - BIG Etching Ground, Akua ink, SoySolve, etc. I started out with a sandpaper aquatint, in which a hard ground is applied before running the plate through the press a few times with a sheet of sandpaper, then etched. I successively stopped out selected areas and re-etched to create a range of values, then did the lines and hatching as several separate states. Those dark black marks are deep holes that crept in during the first etch. I've tried scraping and burning them but that only seems to lighten the surrounding area making them stand out more. I'm wondering if they could be filled in with epoxy or something?
