Wings, wings, wings...

Wings, wings, still more wings...

Now you may be looking at this and thinking "???" (Didn't we see this last week?) Well... I was all excited last week because I "finished" the 4th and final life-scale wing block...but then I got to thinking about the proof (uh oh).  I decided it was good, but needed just a little bit more... 

Proofs - last week on the left and this past week on the right. It wasn't that the marks that were there were wrong, just that it needed some additional work to help round out the feathers; (because these blocks are transparent, the finer marks can be difficult to see on the block, and some of the finest marks didn't print, so I used the proof as a map to go back and add.)

with my shoe for scale

Why does that last 10% end up taking so much time??  Still, now, I think I really do have the wing blocks - thumbs up!  I also started preparing for my next block - I scanned and blew up one of my small relief prints of tracery (a very early block, from April 2014 and still one of my favorites.)

I'll be using this, combined with my research photos from the Met from 2 weeks ago and others to try it at about 12 x 14". Ultimately, I want to get it up to life scale to house the life-scale figure, and I'm not 100% sure how I'll use this intermediate block.  Part of me just wants to skip this size and go all the way up to 30" or larger, but if history is any indication, skipping steps is a no-no. As lovely as the small block is, I feel like I need to practice/refine it before going really big (and realistically, I may even need a second intermediate block). 

The sizes are not an exact science, but there are several factors I try to keep in mind when expanding things: The size of the first block, the size of the polyester plate (if that's being used to print a guide), the size of the press bed, the size of the paper, and the size of the final block. The tolerance for how much something can be expanded depends in part on how much detail is present in the original block, and also what the thing is (how complex/ organic). 

Work continues on the life-scale figure, slooooooowly - trying to hand stitch the parts together in such a way that the stitches become part of the appearance.

Also continuing my mission to print "master copies" of my blocks, scan them, and prepare the files for digital collage. This week, I did the song birds, which are also some of my favorites:

I did prepare the digital files...  

 

But...I also can't help myself from playing with them. Which is all good, and working on a plan to develop some finished work [Hmmmmmm - steeples fingers...]

The other semi-artistic thing from this past week was repairing my front door. Somehow, the button on the side of the door got depressed to make the knob lock (doh). I do not have a key, so I ended up needing to chisel out part of the door frame in order to pop the lock. Luckily, I was able to mostly restore it (and switch the lock covers, which I noticed when I disassembled the knob, had gotten reversed at some point?)

Before and After

             Before and After

I also took some nature shots of the changing season out and about: