Tree Heaven
In honor of my elm tree that will be slaughtered soon (still haven't gotten the final, official word from the City), I wanted to draw a vision of tree heaven for it to go to. The alert viewer will note that there aren't any elm trees here. This is because each death is unique and new. I want my elm to know this. It will be the only one like it here, just like people.

No trees were harmed printing this, since the paper is Somerset, 100% cotton rag (I think). I apologize to my cotton plant readers.

It's also pretty much the first "art" I've done in maybe a year, other than the Darkdevil County game drawings. It's a stone litho. I want you to admire a few things about it: 1) the placement on the page is perfect. No trimming or tearing down or scraping of little shits needed. 2) the ink balance is nearly perfect. I can't think of the last time I managed to print something so well.

Even though it's hot and we have no air conditioning in the studio, the stone printed well, and didn't scum until I was nearly done for the day. I may have overdone the etch a little, burning out some of the detail, but our big bottle of nitric is maybe 10 years old now, and I don't know how good it is. Luckily our studio is in the Chicago area, so getting fresh supplies from Graphic Chemical isn't that hard -- I believe they no longer ship some items. Am not sure whether nitric gets stronger or weaker the older it is. (Yes, I know you're supposed to check the PH, etc., but in the real world, who does?)

Anyway, big build-up for what's just a simple drawing. Which is what else I like about lithography -- you can just DRAW:

Labels: lithography, printmaking

- posted by Cynthia @ 5:58 PM | | | Link |