#etching press

[nathardemo]

The first print. Was just trying out the paints. Gotta polish it a bit to do the next few prints, so there won't be those splotchy places. Digital original

[umdbooklab]

check out our new display cabinet! Matt wanted to get rid of it but Dylan suggested we set it up in here and I like how it looks!

[3liza]

i mean the truth is that we do not need and should not have all this stupid plastic clutter in or houses. no one should be producing or selling this shit. everyone make your own merchandise and charge a living hourly wage to sell it 🤷 sorry to be so simplistic about this but it's one of the results of the lack of class unity specifically in the means of production-owning creative class, who is not mentioned or dealt with by the core Marxist texts as far as I know (i asked about this earlier on here, did marx ever address in his analysis people like, for example, a professional photographer who owns a camera ans prints his own dagguereotypes? or a portrait painter or idk, independent milliner or seamstress? these people all own the means of production and do not employ anyone, and the answer from better educated people than I was that no, Marx didn't mention them), I'm not well read on this at all, there is just a big void where leftist analysis of what modern economists call "the creative class"

I'm getting off topic. my point is make your own keychains in your kitchen. it's actually not hard. you can even mass produce (on a small scale) little plastic crap if you want, with resin and a UV lamp, or a 3d printer, or a laser cutter and acrylic sheets (or just use balsa wood damn, at least its biodegradable and less tacky).

all this stuff is available to little creators AND there are hundreds of people who already own these machines who will take work for you and produce your designs. you just have to actually find them and know them and email them. that's what I mean about the class unity issue with creatives. we have no large scale union, we have no large scale class consciousness, and we're all sending our orders for little plastic crap to sweatshops instead of emailing a guy with a laser cutter in his garage and saying "hey Keith can I get uhhhhhhhhhhh 50 laser cut keychains of this twerking Diggler design I made, like how much would that cost" and he's like sure here's the work and materials cost and tbh it's always always less than i think it's going to be. you just have to do some basic arithmetic and then order shipping, and I hate order fulfillment with my life but you can actually pay or barter with someone to do that for you too. learn to delegate and then factor that into your unit cost. this is basic shit every commercial creator needs to know. they should teach you this in art school but they dont

don't give me crap about "I can't afford a laser cutter" either because I just told you to email Keith. and all these machines get sold secondhand when a manufacturer or hobbyist needs to upgrade. i got a color laser printer perfect for making zines and wheatpastes and shipping labels from a retired lesbian on capital hill for $75 and it was still full of ink. my friend gave me her 20 year old canon dslr because she just didn't need it and didn't want to bother selling it. it works fine because I spent the time finding the right drivers and shit for my computer. and card readers exist. Craigslist. Facebook marketplace. nextdoor sales section. eBay. everyone always forgets eBay. eBay lets you save searches and will email you when it finds a guy selling his vinyl plotter in your city with local pickup. I'm serious

[garadinervi]

Richard Long, Dust Dobros Desert Flowers, (etching), The Lapis Press, Los Angeles, CA, 1987, Edition of 36 [© Richard Long]

[bondibee]

Commemorative print celebrating the opening of my print shop ♥️

I'm gonna be giving these out for free to people who come to the grand opening this Saturday! Maybe I'll keep a few in stock after that too, who knows :)

I can't believe its really happening.... I'm kinda terrified, but life is for the living

[meirimerens]

i'm scared...... hold my hand.

[uwmspeccoll]

It’s Fine Press Friday!

Gypsy is a collection of several poems by James Baldwin (1924-1987), published by sculptor and printmaker Leonard Baskin’s Gehenna Press in Searsmont, Maine in 1989. The book contains a portrait of Baldwin etched by Baskin (1922-2000), printed on blue paper from the original copperplate. This copy is also signed by Baskin. The type is Centaur, cast by Harold Berliner's Typefoundry. The red pomegranate is one of the Gehenna Press's printer’s marks. Though Gehenna often worked collaboratively with poets, this collection was published two years after Baldwin’s death in 1987.

Speaking with The Black Scholar in 1973, Baldwin traced a mid-century shift in black culture in America, as part of the generation born in an urban, northern environment after the Great Migration: “It had become clear,” he explained, “that one could no longer live by the so-called standards of white civilization.” His writing embodies an intense, and honest excavation of history and its implications on the personal, the psychological, the emotional, the spiritual. “History is a very strange crucible and I don’t pretend to understand it; but I do understand at least in my own mind that you are lucky if you are forced to understand your own history.”

To grapple with reality and history through art: Baldwin here speaks to Baskin’s own artistic motivation. A vocal critic of “the irrational and accidental,” Leonard Baskin saw these approaches as the “denial of history.” Sidney Kaplan (1913-1980), an editor at Gehenna, scholar of African American history, and activist, explored Baskin’s portraits of artists:

“The true issue of mastery—the bold and conscious exploration of the past as a past of total reality, the discriminating and weighing of its necessities, the courage and intelligence to use the past without being used or used up by it, the endless desire to know man again and again in all his avatars of flesh and art…all this is what has led Baskin to look hard and long at the deathless faces of those who, for him, have been masters of man’s changing image.”

See other posts highlighting Leonard Baskin.

Check out our Black History Month posts.

--Amanda, Special Collections Graduate Intern

[off-brand-adorabbit]

Working on a little something and thought I would do well not to forget the girlies

[subjectislou]

everyone try tetrapak etching RIGHT NOW!!!

if you have access to a printing press i mean... im sure u can find a tutorial online... very fun

my colours are from laying crayon down on the tetrapak, so easy to access and nothing special :>

[gnecrognomicon]

Sometimes (often) I look at letterpresses and etching presses on ebay or Facebook marketplace and giggle and kick my feet over how beautiful and incredible they all are. Most of them are extremely expensive but today I found a letterpress for $100...it's in absolutely horrible condition, massive, and 4 hours away but if it was in my town it'd be mine already, I think it'd be very cool to repair an old press like that. I scour antique malls for presses every time I go. I am categorically unhinged about printmaking but like, in cycles, and right now? Hoo boy is it taking up my whole brain.

[theftshrubbery]

In Hiding, Joan of Arc 🌷💗🌿🌼

limited etching prints here!

[hexfloog]

Untitled (2017) - Ink

Part of a group of color studies for my undergrad thesis.

[dbphantom]

the H2hoes understand me

[thedowntown500]

[garadinervi]

Richard Long, Dust Dobros Desert Flowers, (hardbound book of seven etchings with earth pigments and 45 RPM record in a slip case), The Lapis Press, Los Angeles, CA, 1987, Edition of 35 [Art: © Richard Long]

Editor: Jerry Sohn Etching: Jacob Samuel Letterpress: Les Ferriss Binding: Klaus-Ullrich S. Rötzscher Publisher: Sam Francis

[khioneee]

tap out. pt ii.

warnings. mentions of death, emotional distress, grief and loss, pregnancy.

a few years later, another tap-out ceremony arrives, but this time, the air feels different—heavier, somber. simon’s been gone for over a year, his deployment unexpectedly extended due to an incident overseas. you’d been told he couldn’t come home for a while, but that didn’t make the waiting any easier.

today, you stand among families who aren’t just here to tap out their loved ones but to say goodbye to those who didn’t make it home. tears stream down faces as loved ones gather around caskets, grieving the soldiers they’d lost. the sight fills you with a mix of dread and relief, knowing simon is still out there, waiting.

simon stands in formation, rigid as always, but he has a sense for you. before you even appear in his line of sight, he knows you’re near. but imagine his surprise when he catches a glimpse of you in his peripheral vision, a small bundle wrapped securely in your arms.

his heart hammers in his chest, quickening as he realizes what this means. his breath catches, his eyes fixed on you as you approach. you look up at him, your eyes sparkling, a knowing smile on your face as you watch the subtle changes in his expression—the slight twitch of his eyebrows, the way his breathing picks up as it dawns on him.

both of you had been trying for a baby before he left, and now, standing before him, you hold that precious life in your arms. it had been a struggle going through pregnancy without him, feeling his absence during every kick and every sleepless night. but seeing him now, looking more than ready to meet your child, all the pain fades away, replaced by a joy so profound it fills every inch of you.

‘daddy’s home,’ you whisper softly, tilting the blanket so simon can see her tiny face, fast asleep, a perfect mirror of him in miniature. she’s got his nose, his quiet strength already etched into her tiny features.

with tears in your eyes, you reach up, your hand finding his cheek, tapping him out in the gentlest of touches.

the moment your hand connects, simon moves, breaking formation as he pulls both of you into his arms, holding you close as if he’ll never let go. his voice is thick with emotion, barely a whisper as he murmurs, ‘my loves.’

you knew your husband had a reputation in the military—a man as cold and unyielding as steel, a fortress no one could break. but as he held you and your newborn in his arms, that carefully built facade cracked, revealing a vulnerable side of him that only you ever saw. the tough soldier was gone, replaced by a man whose heart lay entirely with his family.

‘do you want to hold her?’ you ask softly, watching his eyes light up with a blend of surprise and joy.

‘her?’ he whispers, voice catching on the single word, as if it’s almost too much for him to believe.

you nod, smiling through a haze of happy tears. ‘her.’

with slow, reverent movements, you pass your daughter to him, watching as she looks impossibly tiny cradled in his strong arms. simon looks down at her with a mixture of wonder and fierce protectiveness, as though he’s already memorizing every detail of her face.

as if sensing her father’s gaze, the baby yawns, a soft little sound that makes simon’s eyes shine with awe. you catch the faintest smile pulling at his lips, a rare, tender expression that he reserves only for moments like this.

he leans down, pressing his lips gently to her forehead. ‘never gonna let anything happen to you,’ he murmurs, voice thick with love and quiet promise.

while simon was lost in his quiet moment with your daughter, a loud shout cut through the air, breaking the peaceful silence.

‘is that our baby i see?!’

simon’s head snapped up, his expression immediately shifting to something harder. he turned to see soap grinning widely, practically bouncing with excitement. with a sigh, simon reached over and smacked the back of soap’s head, though his movements were careful not to jostle the sleeping baby in his arms.

‘there’s people grieving, you idiot,’ simon muttered, but soap only snickered, completely unfazed.

‘and what do you mean, ‘our’? she’s y/n’s and mine. you’re not part of this relationship, mate,’ simon added, his tone dripping with mock irritation.

but soap, undeterred, just ignored him and held out his hands, wiggling his fingers in a display of exaggerated excitement. ‘oh, come on! let me hold our child!’

simon groaned, looking down at you with a glance that seemed to ask, ‘do i really have to put up with this?’ but he couldn’t hide the tiniest hint of a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth as soap’s enthusiasm filled the air around you.

reluctantly, and with another sigh, simon finally leaned over, carefully passing your daughter to soap, though not without a low, ‘if you don’t keep her calm, you’re not holding her again.’

soap just grinned, taking her into his arms as if he’d won the lottery, cradling her gently and cooing softly.

soon after, the rest of task force 141 gathered around, drawn by the excitement, each member eager to catch a glimpse of the new addition to the family.

you and simon stood to the side, watching with cautious eyes as they took turns holding her, each one adopting a careful gentleness you wouldn’t have expected from hardened soldiers.

price held her with a proud grin, murmuring something about ‘training her to be the next captain,’ while gaz made her giggle softly with his gentle cooing. even the usually reserved roach softened as he held her, a rare smile tugging at his lips.

you glanced up at simon, watching his face as he stood beside you, arms crossed in a show of casual indifference.

but you knew him too well. beneath the mask of stoicism, there was something warmer, a subtle softness in his gaze as he watched his team, his family, sharing this moment with him. this gruff, unbreakable soldier, who had once thought he’d lost everything, had found a new family among them, one that shared in his joys and sorrows alike.

reaching over, you took his hand, giving it a gentle squeeze. he didn’t say anything, just gave your hand a quick squeeze in return, a quiet acknowledgment. but you could see it in his eyes, that gratitude for a family he never expected to find—a family that had now become part of yours.