New Genre: Installation

 I'm in a New Genre class this semester and it is an awesome class! We deal with "new" types of artwork like installation, sound, performance and video. My first project was an installation project that I decided to use printmaking in. I created 9 different aquatinted intaglio plates that I printed around 35 prints from. This is what my hand looked like about halfway through the printing process...ink everywhere. I love it though :)

Here are what the 9 different prints look like. They are all very simplistic and abstracted representations of things that we see everyday. For example, the mountains, tree bark, sidewalk, the blinds, an iphone, and the moon.

Then I strung all of the prints on white string and hung them from the ceiling to create a space that the viewer could walk through to see all of the prints. I wanted to create an aesthetically pleasing installation that was about the process and time it took to create it. 

It took a lot of time and work but I really enjoyed doing it. Printmaking is so fun! I love it!

Printmaking Final

Today I finally finished my printmaking final. What a relief! I've loved this class, but I have also dedicated so much time to it that it is almost ridiculous. This last project was tough, but it's over now and I'm really pleased with the result. This time we had to make an edition of 8 prints plus a BAT, so 9 prints in total. We also had to make a portfolio box to put our prints in. 

Here's how my box turned out:

Open it up and you find my prints.

Here's what the print looks like. It is a 9x12" Intaglio print using line etching, aquatint and some dry point. It was inspired by the architecture in Alcalá where I stayed in Spain.

2 finals down, 4 more to go!

Printmaking: Intaglio

I just finished my latest printmaking project this morning. It is an intaglio print with both line etching and aquatint. I really like how the aquatint turned out. It's a pretty cool process. For intaglio, you etch your image onto a copper plate using acid. This is the acid room:

The aquatint process uses rosin and acid to create large areas that are one shade. This is what my copper plate looked like after all of the etching was done and I had cleaned off the hard ground:

And this is what the print looks like:

I'm happy with the result! And I'm also glad to get one more thing checked off of my to do list.

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Student Show

This is Maxwell in the printmaking student show at the HFAC:

Max should be proud. He's basically famous now.

Printmaking: Intaglio

My first Intaglio Print: Windmills from Spain.

Eat, Pray, Art: My Life

My life is pretty much like the title of that movie Eat, Pray, Love, except it's more like Eat, Pray, Art and I'm not traveling around the world right now. So it's not necessarily as exciting, but life is still good, it's mainly just super busy. Here are some pictures of what I've been up to lately...

Continuing my still life painting in class. This is a picture in the process so it already looks a lot different than this.

Tuesday was Valentines day, which included getting some delicious cookies from a good friend. Thanks Rose! And hanging out with good friends and watching Passport to Paris. Great times.

I painted this painting for homework for my painting class:

I made the Livingston Family tradition of hotdog pancakes with my roommate Kayla. Before you say that sounds so weird and gross, think about a corndog. It's basically the same thing. Delicious.

On Thursday night I went to another Third Thursday Hinckley Hall reunion, so that was a blast to catch up with some of my favorite girls.

Pretty much this whole weekend has been dedicated to printmaking. I spent from 9 am to 1 pm in the lab, then took a two hour break to eat lunch and go to class, then stayed from 3-7 that same day to finish printing in color. This is the color print by itself. Instead of drawing with a crayon on the plate I used a toner wash this time. It turned out a little different than I was expecting, but I still think it looks pretty cool.

Then on Saturday, after having a delightful morning and lunch with Greg and Melissa and watching The Double Helix for my Bio class (not my favorite movie), I went back to the printing lab to finish off the print with the black ink layer. Lucky for me, I have the best siblings and Jessie brought me some delicious caramel chocolate custard while I was in the lab and I could show her how I printed it (you can see the black test run in the background). Thanks again Jessie!!

After only 2 1/2 hours, I finished printing the black! Hallelujah! Here's the finished print. It's 22x15 inches, so not only was I printing in color, but also on a larger scale this time. I'm pretty happy with the completed image. It's fun to learn all of the different things I can do with lithography, so I'm excited to keep trying out some things. But up next we are doing intaglio. Should be cool.

No school Monday. Delightful. Hope you have a great rest of your long weekend!

Life Lately...

Here are some photos showing what I've been up to lately...

Painting:

Finished my first litho print...I like it. Especially the little giraffe picture.

I celebrated Groundhogs Day by making groundhog cookies complementary of Greg and Melissa and watching the movie.

More painting...

A NEW litho print in the works. I spent about 5 1/2 hours on saturday in the print lab working on this getting it all ready to print. This time we are using 2 colors. I'll have the bird cages in black and then there will be a color image behind it that I'm working on. Hopefully it will transfer well from my head to the plate.

My wonderful mother came into town to visit (sadly I don't have any pictures to document our weekend together) but she did bring me this apron so now I'm reminded of home while I'm working.

My plate in the process with a bunch of super smelly chemicals on it. Always a great time in the lab on a saturday afternoon.

Go in at 1:30 and come out around 6:20 and you get to see this. A welcoming view, especially in the incredibly nice weather we've been having lately. It's the best!

Printmaking: Lithography

In my printmaking class we have switched over the lithography. This is a much more in-depth process than relief printing, but I'm excited to see how my print turns out. Not gonna lie, but I think that my drawing is pretty cool. It took me a really long time to come up with something that I wanted to draw and for some reason hippos kept popping into my head. Originally I had a hippo singing, but it just wasn't working out like I wanted. Then bubbles popped into my head and then this happened...

A hippo taking a bubble bath. This was my original drawing that I then transferred onto my plate and drew using lithography crayons. This next picture is in the process of drawing it on my plate:

This is the plate after drawing the complete picture and putting on my first etch, which involves rubbing different solutions of tapem and gum arabic over certain areas. Then buffing it down and now I have to let it sit so I can move on to rolling it up, putting on the second etch and then learning to actually print it. Wish me luck! I really hopes it turns out well so that I can hang this up in my future bathroom.

Hope you are having a bubbly day!!

Life Lately...

First of all, HAPPY NEW YEAR!!! 

The Livingstons celebrated in style. 

2011 was an amazing year. It'll be hard to beat, but I have a feeling that 2012 is going to be a great one.

In other news...I'm back at school now and it's going great. I'm loving my roommates and classes this semester. I'm taking a printmaking class and I'm almost finished with the first assignment. We are doing relief prints on a linoleum block first. Here's how my project went from a drawing of Maxwell:

To actually carving him out of the linoleum:

And then creating a print:

I think it's turning out pretty cool. Excited to get printing again tomorrow!