I have started a personal website that contains my latest etchings, serigraphs and other information. The new site is

http://www.zhibit.org/tomnaylorprints

Please refer to that site for my latest works as I will no longer be maintaining this blog site because it is too difficult to get to it since Google took over blogspot.

This is somewhat of a circular reference since I reference this link on my website so don't get too confused.

1772

This is yet another print with one of my favorite images, St. Francis de Assis church at Rancho de Taos. This church is one of the most iconic images in New Mexico and has to be seen to be believed.. Every artist who has ever passed through the area has done a rendition of this church: Ansel Adams, Georgia O’Keefe plus many others. There is a very nice book, called “Images of Spirit & Vision, Rancho de Taos Church” published by the Museum of New Mexico Press with nothing but images of the church by 80 different artists. Unfortunately, my work is not included (the book was published before I did this work).

This image is called 1772 because that is the estimate of the year when the first church was built on this site. It employs my fractured glass technique. This is the largest print that I have made of the church. The print is 15 7/8 by 11 7/8 inches. There are three plates, two in blue and one in orange. There is no edition. There are currently 5 prints of this image plus one print with a slightly different color scheme.

Fractured Taos Church I and II

This is a pair of prints that show the progression of an idea. These two prints were made from the same plate as St. Francis at Rancho de Taos I (see 2009 entries). I have taken that plate and modified it. In the left image, I have added what I call a fractured technique which suggests that the image is either on or being viewed through fractured glass. This approach was suggested to me by some of the works of Paul Klee. I added a second plate for the orange of the church. In the right image, I cut the image of the church out of the plate so I could print the background and the church in two separate colors. These two images, plus the original image, show the progression of the same plate through several techniques.

Both images are the same size: 3 7/8 by 3 7/8 inches. Neither one exists as an edition. There are seven prints of the left image and four prints of the right image.

Still Life with Sand Sculpture

This image is based on a photograph I took in very low light levels. I didn’t really expect the photo to come out but it did. I was so taken by the image that I had to try and make an etching of it. I used a reduction aquatint technique which involves etching the entire plate and then, using burnisher and scrapper, removing the etched metal to reveal the image. This is similar to the process used in mezzotint and scratchboard drawing. The image itself evokes a holiday spirit with the bright candles. It also has a mysterious quality with the sand sculpture and candles rising out of a dark background.

The image size of this print is 9 7/8 by 8 inches. There is only one plate. There is no edition. There are a total of four prints: one in black and white, one in all red, and two that are a combination of the black and red images. These latter prints were made by inking and printing the red plate, cleaning off the plate, re-inking it in black, and then printing it over the red print. I added some yellow to the highlights using a la poupee.

Matriarch

This is an interesting etching on several levels. First, most people that I've asked don’t know what it is. Guesses range from horse to bird. Most people focus on the center of the image in trying to figure out what this is. In reality, it is a close up of the eye of an elephant, based on a black and white photo I took. If you look at the whole image, instead of just the center, the elephant becomes more visible. The other thing that is interesting about this etching is that it is an etching of a linocut. I spent a summer cutting this image into a linoleum block. I then made several prints from the block before wondering what it would look like as an etching. So, I covered a plate with soft ground and impressed the image from the linocut into the ground. I then etched it with this result. Of course, the etched image is reversed from the image in the linocut. Also, the etched image is not as clear and crisp as the linocut.

This print is 11 ¾ by 7 ½ inches. There is no edition but there are four artists’ proofs in different colors. They are black, violet/yellow, red and Indian red. The linocut on which this image is based is 12 by 9 inches and there are four of them printed in black.

Dance of the Stars

This image was inspired by Kandinsky’s painting “Several Circles”. I didn’t attempt to copy his image but to base my own idea on several circles in a field. I added my own interest in astronomy to transform the image into a star field dancing around in force fields.

This is a three plate etching/aquatint/destruction ground/collograph/engraving. The image size is 17-5/8 by 11-7/8 inches. There is no edition as yet but there are 17 color proofs printed with three stages of the plates. I wanted to explore this image using various color combinations during which I modified one or more of the plates. This produced an interesting variety of color proofs of which this is one example.

Dancers

This is a reprint of two plates that I created some years ago. The idea was to try to capture the motion of a ballerina in a single image rather than showing 4 ballerinas in different positions. Here I’ve captured four stages of the motion from the beginning to the end.

This is a three plate etching/aquatint/collograph. The image size is 6-3/4 by 4-11/16 inches. There is an edition of 6 as well as a total of 8 artist’s proofs of previous versions as follows:

1 - Dancers I in red/orange

1 – Dancers I in pastel red/orange

1 – Dancers I in blue/red

2 – Dancers I in brown/rose

1 – Dancers II in red/orange

1 – Dancers III

1 – Blue Dancers III