Thin Copper, Thick Lines

Here's a photo I took on Tuesday at school. These are the few remaining leaves on the vine. They're much smaller than the others and hang dowfrom the eaves of the building. You can see what a typical, clear fal day it was. Actually, it does look as though there's a little wisp of clouds behind that tree in the distance.

I was at school today, working on several items I started in the last two class periods. One was a photo etching of a cat, a photo taken by my special friend. We were experimenting with it, because the professor wasn't sure how to remove the photo-sensitive covering from the zinc plate. However, we did figure it out today. We left the plate soaking in developer for half an hour and then it did take the covering off. The plate that I prepared didn't work very well, because it was too pale, but I'll try mixing the ink differently on Tuesday and see if I can get a better print. And I have a second plate that I can work with as well, the same cat photo.

I also was experimenting with sugar lift, an etching technique. You use a mixture of caro syrup, gum arabic, and asphaltum to paint on a plate. When it dries, you cover the rest of the plate with liquid asphaltum and let it dry again. Next you submerge it in warm water. The theory is that the warm water will melt the syryp and gum arabic, removing it from the plate. Then you can aquatint the exposed part of the plate if there are large areas, but the ideal is to paint very thin lines that will act as line etching. But that plate didn't work very well either. I didn't degrease it enough and the asphaltum came up in big chunks. I'll try that again next week, too, if I have time. Anyway, my lines were too thick and globby. But now I understand better what to do.

My third "experiment" was with a zinc plate that I wanted to bite very deepy, creating deep recesses in the plate. The plan is to roll it through a rolling mill with a piece of copper and create bas relief. I left the plate in the nitric acid for a total of three hours, two on Tuesday and one today. It is now covered with quite deep lines. However, the lines are no longer smooth and crisp. They have a sort of dotted look to them. The reason for this is because as the acid bites into the plate, it creates bubbles as the metal is eaten away. You can prevent some of this from happening by taking a feather and running it over the plate, dispersing the bubbes. But I'm not committed enough to spend three hours fanning my plate with a feather. My plan is to try a deep bite with a copper plate which doesn't form bubbles.

After I cleaned the asphaltum off the zinc plate, I printed it. The funny thing was that the lines are so deep that the ink wasn't transferred to the paper properly. If I'm going to print an edition of the plate, I'm going to have to use a stiffer ink, set the press tighter or print a relief print. The etching is normally a print of the lines bitten into the plate by the acid. The lines are dark. A relief print, on the other hand, is a print of the surface of the plate. The lines are white and the background is dark. I might try that. But my main objective is still to use it to emboss copper.

Yesterday, I went to get copper at the supplier, so I could make more baskets. However, the copper I got was too thick. On my way back from the gym this morning, I remembered that I bought copper from them that was on a roll. So I called them to ask if I had in fact done that. They told me that they did have the thin copper on rolls. So this afternoon, I took a large piece from my studio and went back. Now I have just what I want. I also spent a little time at the jewelry supplier where I got some copper wire and chain to use as well. And I have some ideas for enameling pieces of copper and then putting it together afterwards. That could be interesting.