San Marco's Square, Venice No1 - Limited Edition of 75
Print Printmaking, Etching on Paper
33 W x 45.7 H x 0.3 D cm
Ships in a Tube
"San Marcos Square, Venice #1" is the first of three etchings, a triptych, inspired by my journey around Italy. I was particularly drawn to the triptychs in every church I visited – holy relics embodying the Father, Son and Holy Ghost, the foundation of Italian Catholicism. This three-panel format felt right for exploring San Marcos Square.
This etching, printed from steel plates using nitric acid, is a very delicate medium. The original drawings were done from life in San Marcos Square, an extremely busy, bustling place. I aimed to capture the constant movement, with people fading into one another, their connecting lines forming shapes with impressionistic qualities of motion. Only the architecture is stationary.
Back in England, the drawings were transferred to a steel plate, incising the design through a wax ground with an etching point. The plate was then soaked in a nitric acid bath, which bit into the exposed lines. Once the wax was removed, I had the beginnings of a line drawing. It was quite difficult to capture the original sketch initially, but once in the flow, it was almost like being back there; my hand just took over, transcribing memory.
The second part involved aquatint. Steel has an inbuilt quality like aquatint, but I bathed certain areas of the plate in nitric acid to create shadows and tonal qualities. I also "painted" with quite neat nitric acid directly on the plate – what I think you call spit bite. This was furiously fast, the plate turning green, smoking, and bubbling away; sometimes the bubbles were captured in the process, more visible in plate #2, but starting here.
It took many artist's proofs, maybe five or eight, dipping in acid or using spit bite, to establish the quality and translucency I wanted, to capture that sense of time and passing. I didn’t want to draw the full San Marcos Basilica – it seemed too obvious, too much memory already associated with its many depictions. I wanted something away from that: the last edge of the Basilica, the Doge’s Palace towards the water’s edge with gondolas, two of the three flagpoles, and to the right, the start of the tower in the square's middle. Sometimes the acid bite was too harsh; to calm this down, I used sandpaper to brush away some aquatint or heavy steel plate teeth, smoothing them so they weren’t so aggressive, bringing the tone from dark to a lighter grey-black.
Print Printmaking, Etching on Paper
33 W x 45.7 H x 0.3 D cm
Ships in a Tube
"San Marcos Square, Venice #1" is the first of three etchings, a triptych, inspired by my journey around Italy. I was particularly drawn to the triptychs in every church I visited – holy relics embodying the Father, Son and Holy Ghost, the foundation of Italian Catholicism. This three-panel format felt right for exploring San Marcos Square.
This etching, printed from steel plates using nitric acid, is a very delicate medium. The original drawings were done from life in San Marcos Square, an extremely busy, bustling place. I aimed to capture the constant movement, with people fading into one another, their connecting lines forming shapes with impressionistic qualities of motion. Only the architecture is stationary.
Back in England, the drawings were transferred to a steel plate, incising the design through a wax ground with an etching point. The plate was then soaked in a nitric acid bath, which bit into the exposed lines. Once the wax was removed, I had the beginnings of a line drawing. It was quite difficult to capture the original sketch initially, but once in the flow, it was almost like being back there; my hand just took over, transcribing memory.
The second part involved aquatint. Steel has an inbuilt quality like aquatint, but I bathed certain areas of the plate in nitric acid to create shadows and tonal qualities. I also "painted" with quite neat nitric acid directly on the plate – what I think you call spit bite. This was furiously fast, the plate turning green, smoking, and bubbling away; sometimes the bubbles were captured in the process, more visible in plate #2, but starting here.
It took many artist's proofs, maybe five or eight, dipping in acid or using spit bite, to establish the quality and translucency I wanted, to capture that sense of time and passing. I didn’t want to draw the full San Marcos Basilica – it seemed too obvious, too much memory already associated with its many depictions. I wanted something away from that: the last edge of the Basilica, the Doge’s Palace towards the water’s edge with gondolas, two of the three flagpoles, and to the right, the start of the tower in the square's middle. Sometimes the acid bite was too harsh; to calm this down, I used sandpaper to brush away some aquatint or heavy steel plate teeth, smoothing them so they weren’t so aggressive, bringing the tone from dark to a lighter grey-black.
Print Printmaking, Etching on Paper
33 W x 45.7 H x 0.3 D cm
Ships in a Tube
"San Marcos Square, Venice #1" is the first of three etchings, a triptych, inspired by my journey around Italy. I was particularly drawn to the triptychs in every church I visited – holy relics embodying the Father, Son and Holy Ghost, the foundation of Italian Catholicism. This three-panel format felt right for exploring San Marcos Square.
This etching, printed from steel plates using nitric acid, is a very delicate medium. The original drawings were done from life in San Marcos Square, an extremely busy, bustling place. I aimed to capture the constant movement, with people fading into one another, their connecting lines forming shapes with impressionistic qualities of motion. Only the architecture is stationary.
Back in England, the drawings were transferred to a steel plate, incising the design through a wax ground with an etching point. The plate was then soaked in a nitric acid bath, which bit into the exposed lines. Once the wax was removed, I had the beginnings of a line drawing. It was quite difficult to capture the original sketch initially, but once in the flow, it was almost like being back there; my hand just took over, transcribing memory.
The second part involved aquatint. Steel has an inbuilt quality like aquatint, but I bathed certain areas of the plate in nitric acid to create shadows and tonal qualities. I also "painted" with quite neat nitric acid directly on the plate – what I think you call spit bite. This was furiously fast, the plate turning green, smoking, and bubbling away; sometimes the bubbles were captured in the process, more visible in plate #2, but starting here.
It took many artist's proofs, maybe five or eight, dipping in acid or using spit bite, to establish the quality and translucency I wanted, to capture that sense of time and passing. I didn’t want to draw the full San Marcos Basilica – it seemed too obvious, too much memory already associated with its many depictions. I wanted something away from that: the last edge of the Basilica, the Doge’s Palace towards the water’s edge with gondolas, two of the three flagpoles, and to the right, the start of the tower in the square's middle. Sometimes the acid bite was too harsh; to calm this down, I used sandpaper to brush away some aquatint or heavy steel plate teeth, smoothing them so they weren’t so aggressive, bringing the tone from dark to a lighter grey-black.