3/52 - noughts and crosses .....

I had lots of fun making book number three for this year's project.  Right back into my crosses, though adding the circular imagery is not common in my work.   Hence the name 'noughts and crosses'.  I have been reading a book by Charles Seife called 'Zero - The Biography of a Dangerous Idea' which is totally enthralling and have a suspicion that the idea of zeros (noughts) in my work has stemmed from that.  Who knows ...

I had the privilege of working for a couple of days in a friends amazing studio and used the first day to draw and play, making my third book for the year.  I used the second day to do some printmaking, etching and aquatinting, which was enormous fun.  In my heart of hearts I am still a printmaker and I still hold onto the hope that maybe one day .....

You can see the mess I make sharpening my graphite pencils on the paper.  I do this so that I can then use all the shavings and rub the graphite into my images.  

Using the graphite to rub in soft shapes.

By using transparent papers as well as the Japanese lightweight papers, and aged brown tracing paper too, I am able to read imagery from the page beneath.

I made the covers out of grey board with a simple window cut to reveal some of the work on the first page.  Coptic binding was used to secure the work - a difficult exercise with such an assortment of japanese papers and architectural film.

Some of the details of the pages.  It was interesting to me to find that my comfort zone, or my preferences have changed.  I used to love dwelling in the dark areas, in obscurity, but find now I am really enjoying working more subtly and in the brighter lighter realm.  I am enjoying softness and light - not that this is new for me but I certainly have had a pre disposition to work into the depths and darks in the past.  In this book, and there are many pages (some still waiting for further work), I have only worked on two dark images and they are not my favourite pages.