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I went to meet printer Simon Marsh. I was particularly interested in seeing some Photogravure prints. The studio has a mezzanine floor where artists can draw their plates and where the print archive is kept. First he showed me some prints they had recently editioned for Matt Collishaw (a similar print was included in the recent "Provenance" exhibition in the University gallery).
Simon was working on a series of prints for Damian Hirst when I visited. These prints are also Photogravures, using copper plates. Photogravure is the original way of producing photo-etchings, see previous blog entry "P.H. Emerson and Marsh Leaves" (October) on Emerson's book in the library; the plates for that were made in the same way.
These copper plates need to be regularly steel-faced (a process of steel-plating) to make them last the duration of the edition.
This is what the plate looks like with its steel coating, which is incredibly thin and wears out quickly. The plate needs re-facing every 10 prints or so.
Proofs of the print are made and then selected and approved by the artist.
Any adjustments are made at this stage and a "B.A.T." is made, which stands for "Bon a Tirer" or "Good to Print", and all the following prints have to match this print exactly, see printer's notes.
This print is made using 4 separate etching plates. Two plates are used for the butterflies, one in several colours for the base layer of the wings, the other in several shades of blue for the wing detail, which is then printed over the first print. Then there are 2 plates that are printed on top, both black but slightly different shades of black, which gives the rich density of the final print.
This print is being made in two different colourways, a blue edition and a red edition.
The finished prints are stretched on wooden boards and hung up to dry. When dry they are taken off their supports, and the paper torn down to size.
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