Etching in the round

 Double Dipping

A late snowstorm shut down most things today and provided me with a snow day. Hopefully the last til next winter.  I can't begin to tell you how tired I am of winter, its been relentless this year.

So having a day to be in studio was a bonus.  I am in between paintings, so was clearing up, writing content for an upcoming online drawing workshop and uncovered some blank acrylic cd protectors.  These are the clear acrylic sheets, the same size and shape as the cd which protect the top of a stack of blank cds that come on a spool, if that makes sense.  As I use a fair number of cds at work there were a handful kicking around so I grabbed them, thinking I could do something with them.

Using an etching stylus, I scratched an image of a boy fishing for capelin with dip nets taken last summer at the beach.  Of course the central hole and circular ridge are present, but that adds to the uniqueness of the etching.

I used Caligo etching ink in Carbon Black to cover the plate, removed the excess, then hunted around for a few pieces of paper to test print.  The first I grabbed was an Unryu Japanese paper known as “cloud-dragon” This paper istranslucent with long kōzo fibers embedded in it.  I sprayed it lightly with water then sandwiched the disc, paper and padding and put it through my bottlejack press.  The image above is the result.

I did a couple more which were not as clear and may be because the paper wasn't as damp, but I will keep them and add some colour to them and see how well that works.  The etching burrs on drypoint tend to degrade with excess prints and don't hold as much ink, so the number of prints will be limited.

There are any number of options for etchings using these disc protectors that likely would just be thrown out or recycled in other ways.  Watch for more circular etching ideas using these in the future.