(above) Photograph of the artist’s drawing and writing on clear Mylar featuring a pen and ink study after Self-Portrait with Night: Side Panels I (above, at left), and handwritten texts in Rapidograph ink (above, at right) and in sumi ink (lower, at right). The drawings on Mylar will be photographically transfered to a printing plate to begin the print.

Part 1: Drawing test on Mylar

Jim Stroud of Center Street Studio, printer and publisher, has invited me to work on a new print project. Jim’s wife, artist Janine Wong suggested that I make a variation on my accordion journal/drawings. These are folded drawings that I created in 1986 and 1987. See image below. I’m envisioning my new print will evolve as series of studies based around the drawings that I am currently creating. The print will be printed and then folded, accordion-style at the end of the project. Each panel of the accordion-fold will be 4 x 6 inches, the page size of my current journals.

First we will do some tests to find an effective way to transfer my drawing/writing to the printing plate. I will work on clear Mylar that accepts pen and ink and send it to Jim. Jim will place the Mylar face down on a photographically-sensitized printing plate, expose the plate to a strong light, and then develop the plate. Hopefully the writing will be transferred to the plate in clear, precise detail. Because the Mylar was reversed, the writing will re-reverse when printed and read correctly.

Using my 4×0 Rapidograph pen on the Mylar, the ink seemed too thin. I doubt that it would be dark enough block the light which is the key to a solid transfer to the printing plate. I found some sumi ink that is much darker and flows beautifully from the tiny point of my dip pen; but the sumi is not waterproof. The slightest moisture could re-wet the ink. I will use the non-waterproof ink and take precautions to keep the Mylar dry. I’ve also done a copy of a drawing that I’m currently working on, Self-Portrait with Night: Side Panels I . I’ll mail the Mylars to Jim for him to transfer to the plate. Although the drawing and writing will eventually be printed on the same sheet, each will go on a different printing plate because they require different handling in the development process. (To be continued)

Charles Ritchie, Accordion Drawing, 1986, watercolor, graphite, and pen and ink on Arches paper, approx. 4 x 30″ (uncatalogued). The forthcoming print project will be based on the format of this series of drawings.

Printmaking techniques deliver results you can get no other way. My favorite example is my aquatint, Sky from the portfolio Five Days/Five Nights. I have been trying to achieve soft-edged clouds like these in watercolor for years, but the task of dissolving many complex watercolor edges at once is impossible because the paper dries too quickly. An intricate field of graduated tones as seen in Sky is easily achieved in aquatint.

To make an aquatint, very fine particles are sprinkled across the printing plate and attached by heating the plate. Acid mixed with Karo syrup is used to paint selectively on the plate; diluting the acid cuts it to the proper potency while keeping it from simply beading up on the metal plate. The mixture burns into the printing plate wherever it is applied cutting microscopic channels around the tiny particles adhered to the plate. These recessions hold the printing ink.

To create the clouds in Sky, the aquatinted plate was first painted in selected areas with clear Karo syrup containing no acid. These points are the areas where I wanted white clouds to appear, so acid is gently blocked at these points. I then painted on top with acid mixed with brown Karo. Unprotected areas of the copper printing plate were eaten into while slowly breaking down the edges of the clear blocking Karo syrup which created the soft gradations of tone.

The impetus for the Sky image came to me while working at Center Street Studio print workshop in Boston. After a particularly grueling and unsuccessful day in the shop we went to printer/publisher Jim Stroud’s rooftop. The cumulus clouds that rushed by us were nothing but pure inspiration. The next morning I dove into a small aquatinted plate with the Karo syrup/acid mixture, working without sketches. The adventure with this plate was the turning point in my five days of experimentation which resulted in the portfolio of ten aquatints Five Days/Five Nights.

(above) Photograph of the artist’s spitbite aquatint worktable as it looked in April 1999 at Center Street Studio in Boston, Massachusetts. Printer James Stroud is in the background. The term spitbite aquatint means that the acid was selectively applied to the printing plate rather than immersing the plate in an acid bath. The term spitbite is derived from the fact that saliva was in earlier times mixed with the acid rather than a gum substance such as Karo syrup. Note: the acid is actually a caustic agent, Ferric Chloride. Also note, the photograph above shows the artist’s journal, the image source for many of the Five Days/Five Nights prints, held open with clamps in front of a small mirror, a method that subverts the natural image reversal that occurs in printmaking.

(above) The ten proofs for Five Days/Five Nights are seen at right on the proofing wall at Center Street Studio.