Re: Mailing ist OK?
Looks like I'm the last to check in, &, alas the least. Not that I didn't have a couple of fabulous visitors... Michael Koch-Schulte dropped by from Winnipeg (that's in Canada, guys, and nothing like Wyoming, the official home of our esteemed vice president who is actually from Texas, but because Pres. & VP can't be from same state, set up residence in the next best place) and brought me (that's Michael brought, not Dick) an utterly charming gum print, practically his first he claimed (which is really outrageous, I mean in Wyoming they could kill you for less) titled "Gum Cowboy, Winnipeg, 2007." So this photograph of a cartoony cowboy figure holding a "Westbrook Inn" sign, with street lamps sprouting above and below, has a surface of creamy dead matte. And, contrary to the way things oughta be, perfectly beautiful. No gelatin (or other) size, he said, and yet, no staining. Hunh? The paper I forget, maybe a Fabriano coldpress, but the secret of the effect, he said is "Sam Wang's technique." That is, cyanotype for the blue layer, first coat. Then yellow then red (or the other way around? .... Michael?) with color seps by some cockamamie system he's working out, showed me the color grid for the color curve done in consultation with... is it OK to say Clay Harmon? (No I'm not running for political office, just feel like showing that every so often I remember a name.) Image is a tad over 5" by 7 inches. But speaking of Mr. Wang, does everybody/anybody know his "Bad Apple Series"? I've got TWO --- nyah, nyah. Just the concept alone is right up there with Martin Parr's series "The Last Parking Space," seen on MartinParr.com, which is SO FAR, the best website in history of the world, the only comfort being that Parr doesn't do gum. But, as I was saying the handwriting on the wall (in cyan, majenta & yellow) says I'm going to have to learn neg system flashed by Koch-Schulte, or equivalent thereof, which to put it politely, peeves me no end. Meanwhile, I'm suffering brain death and tantrums worthy of la Naomi Campbell (tho I haven't been sent to clean toilets for community service yet, except that may be upcoming) trying to render a website worthy of presidential T-shirts that informs & amuses without the STUPID TV TRICKS, websites seem given to. Triple yuck. (Tho if word gets out that I have browser-ability, a deluge of family photographs will arrive, so shssssshhhh! This is not the three big faggots connection I've mentioned, the fellas have copped out. Sometimes it's my daughter's, but when hers conks out, it's "apt.15." Sure wish I knew what connection & router they have --- apt.15 NEVER fails.) But I was seething about something else -- gum prints... other peoples. Carmen brought down three, HUGE, STUNNING, EXQUISITE gum prints .... self portraits in settings both real and devised, hard to say which the more magical. (She says she does have that stunning, astonishingly 3-dimensional-looking cover on her sofa, but I can attest does not have red stripes as from an American flag across her face.) She's doing color separations, I think she said by photo shop, but possibly with a touch of Mark Nelson (sorry Mark, sorry Carmen, it's the paint fumes.... Mort took it into his head to paint a door in the hall, & the closest I came to art today was mixing the grey color to match the old one.) ON TOP OF WHICH, Carmen cooked dinner while we mostly gabbed... pork loin with cherry & shallot sauce for centerpiece. I'd made an apple blitzkuchen I hadn't made since practically high school. (It was OK, but not its old wonderful self... I need to revive that golden oldie -- & more apples.) Carmen is a freeform gum printer, that is, despite perfectly proper color seps, will do maybe 11 coats... If, say, a face and arm are too pink, she'll put a very faint coat of, say, green, over. She also goes through a LOT of gum arabic, now using Daniel Smith's (which has gotten quite expensive, as I gather has all gum arabic ... due to the gum weevil? no, due to drought among the acacia trees, last I heard). I do trust that present encumbrances will ultimately dissolve & I will be tootling into the gum prints waiting in a hundred jpegs... But first, I have a date with the NYC Environmental Control Board, of which the inspectors have been playing hanky panky and, it looks like, giving us somebody else's tickets for... are you ready? having a piece of paper in the gutter on a windy day. Last month it was a paper cup in the paper recycling bag. I'm considering a Small Owners' Blog, or SOB, to put the heinousness on record, but may end up having to throw a cell phone at them (and I do have a derelict cell phone around here somewhere -- at least that would be a constructive destruction). There's also the fire department, being noble, protecting us from not having our sprinklers inspected every 25 minutes... I wonder if you could develop a gum print via sprinkler system? (Yes it's affected my mind. Fortunately, I type fast.) One other thing... if anyone is still reading... what's the heaviest paper you can put through an inkjet printer... I want to copy some dirty washers, cut them out and paste them on my kitchen cabinet knobs. Echt '30s look, amazing. enough? enough ! cheers? cheers, Judy
|