Sunday, 2 February 2014

Neil Woodall

Works done by Neil Woodall
Aquatint Prints
Sheffield Millenium Gallery

The Forest 2013

Gorsey Bank 2013

Derwent-Upstream from Haddon 2013

Neil Woodall is the artist that I have chosen to base my report on. His work is a series of aquatint etchings of natural landscapes landscapes that are based on the peak district. The quality of the prints are amazing, the detail and skill that has gone into the print plates are on another level.They look photo realistic but with a rough blotched effect that gives them some style. I like the absence of colour and how he still maintains a high level of detail using different shades of gray. He also mangoes to achieve depth in his prints with slight changes of the tones. The process is a very long and time consuming one but once the print plates are done he is able to achieve many prints from one plate but the plate will eventually ware. Firstly he degreases the plate with ammonia so there are no traces, as this would contaminate the plate. he then paints ares that he wants to achieve a certain tone using a paint. Then he covers the other areas with a stop out varnish, from there he places the plate in a container (known as aquatint box)that circulates a dust that covers the plate and sticks to the exposed areas. From there he places it into a acid bath so it eats into the exposed area and creates a tone, the longer you leave the plate in the acid bath the darker the tone, then he removes the varnish using mentholated spirits, this is process of how he will build up image. To print with it he works a ink into the plate so it goes into all the groves of the image, then he wipes of the excess ink with a cloth until it is polished up and ready for print, he prints using a big printing press that pushes the inked plate onto paper to then reveal a print as shown above.

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