29 Days until the Installation of XXX+WHY Printmaking Exhibition, Pinnacles Gallery, Townsville, Australia

Welcome, and thank you for joining me today on my printmaking journey.

I am in the last 29 days of preparation of my work to be included in XXX+WHY printmaking exhibition and I'm going to tell you what I am doing and what I will be doing to achieve my goal in 29 days.

I currently have about 10 running meters, this is the length of wall my prints will be displayed on including space between the print I will explain in another post how you calculate the required running meter length, of wall space completed and I need another 8 - 10 to create before Monday 26 April 2010. The total length of the wall is 19 meters long.

I am working with large scale aluminium plate 800 x 600 mm. Today I have polished the back of plates that I have already used, this is  great way to maximize your costs just be careful to block out the existing image properly so you do not get any foul biting in the acid.

After polishing the plates i degreased the plates with English Whiting which is a common house hold cleaner in powder chalk form. I have included a photo of me in my laundry doing this.

The next step for me is to block the existing image out on the back of the plate with bitumen paint to protect it whilst the plate is submerged in acid.

After the bitumen is dry I will then place the plate in the acid bath for 1 minute to give the whole plate an even grey tone.

The next step for me after I go and watch my eldest son, Holden, get graded at Taekwon-do, will be to take my plates to the Echlin Street Quarry where I have been drawing my inspiration from for this body of work. I carry the plates into the restricted area, as it is thought to be not safe to the public- hoons basically drive stolen cars up there and dump them, and paint directly onto the plates with sugarlift using either a brush or sticks and rocks found on site. I enjoy using the found objects as i get lovely scratches and unique marks that i could not get with a brush.

I need to be very careful with the plates bringing them home that the sugarlift does not get smudged or removed.

The next process will be to coat the surface of the plate including the dried sugarlift with a very thin layer of bitumen, wait for it to dry then submerge the plate in tepid water and wait for the sugarlift to dissolve and lift the bitumen.

I will then apply a enamel spray aquatint to the exposed aluminium and etch for around five minutes each.

I am working on three plates today which I intend to print each plate in black then combine all three plates to create one colour etching.

Today I have talked about what I have done so far and what I am going to achieve by this evening, tomorrow I will discuss the out comes.

P.S If you have any questions or would like to leave a comment I would love to hear from you.

Warmly
Jo Lankester

The secret to getting ahead is getting started
Mark Twain
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