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Bits and pieces and stuff

I'm moving around in my studio between different projects, which is not a great way to work, as I like to keep up sustained progress over a length of time before moving on to the next thing. I'm trying to finish off some rewards for the Kickstarter Project Patty and I did at the beginning of the year. This set of rewards involves cutting up some 2" x 4"s into short lengths, to which I will glue some small prints. Here they are with a few coats of acrylic varnish on them, and then a layer of airbrush pigment:



I am also reusing old plates to make collagraphs, by coating them with layers of acrylic varnish:


Finally, I recently consolidated two studios into one (long story, but now everything is in one place in Chicago). I have dozens of etching plates, mainly copper, that have been wrapped and in storage for nearly a decade, so I am trying to clean up six or so at a time, to see which ones can still be used, and which ones can be recycled:


Note how the bubble wrap seems to have transferred a big dot pattern to the surface while the plate was busy oxidising. I will take a test proof from this plate next week and hope that this doesn't show up. Otherwise, there will be a lot of copper plates that will need to be resurfaced!
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