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Interlochen Printmaking: Day 1

It was solarplate intaglio all day, in the bright sunshine of northern Michigan. We were indoors and outdoors all day long, starting with drying off the ink drawings on the acetate (click on any of the following images to display larger versions):


Then we exposed the solarplate for a few minutes with an aquatint screen over them, to create that first 'tooth' for the image to adhere to:

Next, exposing the acetate image over the aquatinted solarplates, for just over three minutes:

I posted online earlier a picture of Ava's plate drying afterwards in the sun. Here is Ashley's:

And then the prints (these photos show their second plates):


On the lower image, there is a grey circle created by a drop of water hitting the solarplate before it was exposed to the sun. It turned into one of those errors that gets incorporated into the final plate and ends up looking quite good. We printed two plates for each participant, and they all came out with a great, dark etch that produced these deep-toned prints. All printed using Akua Intaglio inks, by the way.

This was a great first day. Tomorrow, overprinting the plates and creating an edition for each participant.
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