Barry
Moser’s soundtrack begins abruptly, as this video was almost twenty years
ago--right in the art school’s studio classroom, “live”, as they say, just as
it happened, and words of his introduction of this renown illustrator, Barry
Moser, was not included in the soundtrack.
Barry
Moser: As I said last night [in his lecture preceding
the workshop] the art of wood engraving or--as I really to prefer to call it
the craft of wood engraving--is a craft, which involves several different
tangential crafts. The first craft is the making of the block. The second craft
is the drawing, and drawing is after all, a craft. And the third craft is the
craft of printing.
And so I think that it's interesting, first of
all, to look at the wood, and see and talk about wood -- what woods are
suitable, why they're suitable, and so forth. These blocks here are pieces of
boxwood. These come from T. N. Lawrence's shop in London. The woods that we use
for wood engraving--boxwood is the premier wood, that's the wood I'd much
rather use then anything else, because the way it grows, is so even, and the
density is so consistent.
We also use holly, which is a tree that grows
pretty much the way that boxwood does and is desirable for precisely the same
reason. Other woods that are usable are pear--cherry can be used but it is the
softest of all of them--and maple.
And it's been my experience in trying to bring
these blocks from Great Britain over here that they don't work too well in America
because of the difference in heating systems. In this country I would recommend
that students, particularly, use maple in the beginning because maple, one, is
less expensive, two, American block makers make better maple blocks then they
make boxwood blocks; and I find that maple blocks are quite good, and so I'm
buying more and more maple as I get older.
Question:
where do you buy your blocks?
B.
Moser: I buy my
blocks from two sources, basically. One is Sander Wood Engravers in Porter,
Indiana. The others source is American Wood Type which is in Long Island City,
it is American Printing Machinery and Equipment Corporation.
Now, to continue with this
matter of making the block. The tree, of course grows like this. With the [he
gestures with his hand, showing how a tree grows] moving in this direction and
the tree is sawed off into the various rounds. Now, one tree will yield
hundreds of these rounds. The first thing that happens is that the block maker
cuts of one square edge, one flat surface. And from that he will square off
other blocks. You see how the block will come out of that piece. Those blocks
are then pieced together, like so. And you can make huge blocks. So, generally
speaking, the largest blocks will run 25 by 19 inches. That's a huge block.
The reason why the British
blocks don't work so well in this country is--and I should define, now, the
term "check" which I mentioned a minute ago--is that when they are
made in England, they're made in--you know, if you traveled over there, you know
how bloody cold the keep their flats, and they do the same thing in their
shops. So when they come over here, the change in the heating systems causes
these blocks, along these lines where the’re joined, to pull apart. That's
called a "check."
I should tell you--and I
don't have the tools simply because I don't own them--to show you how the
blocks are finished. Well, basically the first thing that happens is the round
is taken with that square edge and jammed up against a stop. And then the block
maker wedges it this way with another piece of wood, into his stomach, so it's
perfectly firm. And with a great jack plane, a big box plane, planes that
surface so that its smooth. Not perfectly smooth, but smooth, constantly
checking it with a flat rule to make certain that the surface is flat all the
way across.
And, more importantly,
that the distance here to here is, and from here to here, is the same. And that
equals the distance from there to there, and from here to here. [Mr. Moser
indicates with his fingers the thickness of the block at all sides and
corners.)
The block has to be level
if printed in a printing press because a letterpress-printing machine is
adjusted so that it prints a height which is.9178th of an inch. That's
9,178-10-thousands of an inch. Where that measure ever came from I do not know,
but it is the universal printers measure and it's called type high. And all
would engraving blocks are made type high, that's so they can be printed
alongside type in a page, because, you see, the medium itself was
traditionally--and is still is traditional--a books smith's craft or a book
smith's, an illustrators art.
Then the next thing that
happens is that with a great blade of steel, which is like a saw blade with no
teeth on it, and very is held in the hand leaning away from the block maker and
pushed, and shaved, and the shavings of that wood on the other side. That's the
most incredible part to me because, when I asked--I thought, "My God,
that's a nice little trick to know." And I said, "How long would it
take me to learn how to do that?"
He said, "Well, it
takes most people about eight years to learn how to do that so that the hand
doesn't favor this side or the other side but to stay perfectly level and he
shaves the surface of the block off, and he constantly checks it with calipers
to make sure that he's getting it down to that type-high measurement. And then
the final thing is a piece of sandpaper--actually a piece of glass paper, very
fine grit glass paper--and sand this way.
Now that last process is
something that I do need to show you, because if you do buy American blocks
your chances are you're not going to get wood that comes ready to cut. And it
is necessary, then, to sand it. The problem with sending the block is this: you
will take a piece of sand paper and wrap it around a piece of, a block of
wood--which is itself absolutely flat. Now if you start sanding a block like
this, what happens is that once you get to the corner, there's more pressure on
that corner because most of the block is off, right? So you're going to hit
that corner a little bit and that corner is going to start rounding down. And
so is this one and so is this, and so ultimately you'll have a nice bowed
shape.
As long as you're printing
by hand and your hand-rubbing your print, that doesn't really bother you too
much. That's okay, but if you ever go into a printing press with a block like
that, the edges simply won't print. So the block has to be absolutely smooth,
and I think that any wood engraver, it behooves that person for the purity of
the craft itself, that block should be absolutely flat and the same thickness
all the way through.
It's not absolutely
critical that the block be .918th of an inch, it can be less than that because
you can go behind the block and build up. Build up with paper or with cardboard
or chip board. At any rate, I do think that it is important that the block be
kept flat, and the way you do that is to take several smaller blocks and put
them around it, like this. And sand those blocks as well, so as the sanding
block moves around in a circular motion, it's staying level out there because
the pressure is being absorbed here on the corner.
So, just remember to take
a few extra--and they don't have to be big blocks, just little pieces, and sand
them like that. Now what I do is to start with a heavy grit, say 120, and then
move to 220 and then up to 400 and finally, I'll end up with emery cloth. If I
want to put on a really high finish on a block. I used to be very precious
about that. Oh, I was so precious, to hold that block up to a raking light and
I wouldn't work on it until it was like a mirror. It had to have an absolute
mirror finish. I've become much less precious. And, in fact, too high a
finish--put a real high finish on a block--put India ink on it and the India
ink will chip off. So, some of the blocks that I get from England, which have
that kind of a high finish on them, they have to be roughed a little bit. I
have to take a piece of sand paper and take that finish off so that the ink
will stay.
Any other questions about
blocks, per se? I'd like to start talking about drawing.
Question:
How much does it cost, a block?
BM: I don't know. We
talk about 25 dollars a square foot these days. The maple is considerably cheaper,
by, let's say, half. And Sander makes a student grade boxwood which has flaws
in it for a lot less money than that. The problem with those student grade
woods is that there'll be a flaw in the grain. When you're cutting it with a
tool will be, having a lot of resistance with that dense would then it will hit
one of those green--and inevitably their green in color, or gray, they look
like rot of some sort--and the tool will hit that an zoom and it's like
suddenly going from steel into butter. And it's quite amazing. But, about
twenty-five dollars a square foot, so you can figure from that.
Okay, the next thing is
the--I don't know whether to say it's the most important thing or whether it's
the least important thing--or how to describe drawing. Because, what happens
here on the sheet of paper and what happens on the block is essentially the
same sort of thing. In engraving, someone one time said to me, when I was first
studying engraving as line engraving, engraving on copper, said "There's
no such thing as spontaneous engraving."
The idea spontaneity in
engraving is an oxymoron. It's like an athletic scholarship, I mean it--the two
things are almost mutually exclusive. You can not engraver spontaneously. So,
if I want an image, which is a fresh, spontaneous image, that spontaneity, that
freshness, has to occur in the act of drawing.
It's the kind of thing
that, when I was a student, my teachers always tried to get me get me to do:
"Leave those things alone," you know, "those nice, wonderful
spontaneous things." I could never--I'd always erase them. And it's the
kind of things in my students' works, "Leave it alone, for Christ's sake,
that's nice, just leave it be," you know, "be satisfied that you've
made a nice drawing, right there. You don't need to go any further than
that!"
Well, I remember, you
know, that my teachers always wanted me to just leave things like that be. And
you can work back into the drawing then in a very loose kind of way and then
come back into and reduce--I have a razor blade I, that I cut up, a piece of
this plastic eraser into a tiny little point that gives me some very fine
erasing possibilities. Then I can erase all that stuff and get rid of them.
But it still there. Then I
can come back, perhaps even with a brush more so than with a pen, and
then--move off like that. Because anything that I've done that moves into
critical areas, I can always cut away. It doesn't always have to be that
precise. And that's the one thing to remember about drawing for wood engraving,
is that the drawing does not necessarily have to be that precise, because--this
isn't the finished work, here--the finished work is engraved. Engraving
interprets the drawing. Anything that I move over into that leaf [Moser is
referring to a drawing of a leaf] that should be there I can just 'swish'
[cutting motion] cut that away.
I have a personal
philosophy of aesthetics, which is--not only does it deal with the problems of
drawing and engraving, of printing and design and typography--it also has to
do--it touches everything that I do in my life. The idea, the philosophy is
trying to achieve a balance between opposite things, a balance between things
of wide disparity. I mean, it's as simple as light and dark. Or, as complex as
light and dark, whichever way you want to see that.
Black is as necessary as
white, of course. Sadness and happiness. A constant play, back and forth
between simplicity and complexity. Now, you notice I have not said, that I will
not say anything about objects and drawing of objects. Because I'm not sure
that it's important, I'm not sure that it's unimportant either, but Clive Bell,
in 1914, in his book, "Art," said that, "Subject matter in art
may or may not be harmful. But always it's irrelevant." In a composition
it's much more important to place blacks and whites next to each other, to
place openness--open space--and closed space next to each other, the
juxtaposition of line and form, the juxtaposition of value and texture and all
those sorts of things. For their own sake, first. Subject matter comes out of
those things, rather than the other way around.
I'm sitting here drawing
apples, and the reason I'm drawing apples--I was thinking a minute ago, as I
say to my students at school, I say, "You know, art has nothing to do
whatsoever with drawing apples that look like apples. If I make a drawing of an
apple--because it looks like an apple it is not important--is not as important
as the way in which they're done."
Now, those of you who
are--like Iris said [Iris Nichols, the organizer of this workshop] are in
technical illustration, that's just--you can't work with that kind of
philosophy very well, I would imagine. I mean, when I'm doing illustrations for
wild flowers which have to be technically accurate like the wild flower book I
spoke of--that kind of technical drawing it's very hard to start with a great
gesture of a brush. It doesn't work.
You can, perhaps, get into
it later a little bit later by various techniques of stopping-out and what have
you, but at any rate--with that sort of illustration, subject matter is very
important. But basically, for image making, I'm not sure, I'm not convinced
that subject matter is all that important.
Now, what I would like to
do is to share with you for just a few minutes the techniques that I use for
drawing. I think that what we first of all we have to do in drawing is to
understand the tools that we're working with and to understand the structures
of making images. Because the principles which are true for composition of
music are the same principles which are true for the composition of poems,
which are the same principle which are true for the composition of images. It's
all the same thing. It's all the same fabric, they're just different threads.
The difference between
those tools and these tools--is that those things were made from living matter;
these things aren't. And, so, therefore, it seems to me that the brush is a
more lively drawing tool. For instance, I know of no tool in the world which
will--I don't know this paper so I don't know what's going to happen--that will
give me a line that is that thin and which, at the same time will give me this.
[Moser draws with the brush.]
An extraordinary thing
happened there. All with one tool. There's no way that I'm going to get this to
do that. That's all it going to give me. Ho hum. [Moser pretends he's bored,
drawing laughter from the audience]. Now, a good Crow quill pen, which I don't
have with me because I don't want anybody to see a Crow quill pen associated
with one of these blocks; because any steel point tool will scratch the
surface, you see, so you can't, or you shouldn't, use them.
But a good Crow quill pen
point has similar characteristics, but nothing like the sense of dynamics that
a brush has. And that's what I love about drawing like this. Well, working in
this kind of technique presents a real problem for wood engraving. Because, how
do you get this kind of spontaneity, how do you get that kind of tonality. How
do you get that kind of drawing on to a block, because if you're working just
with the black ink on the block--if I take the brush fully charged with black
ink, I can do the same kind of drawing--but now, if I don't like it, what do
you do?
Well, the only thing you
can do is sand it off. Sand it off, and get rid of it. And so I played around
with that for awhile, then I thought, well, there are other things that I would
like to do. Let's say, for instance, I were doing a technical drawing--a
technical illustration of an apple. That came up earlier today. And I want to
make certain of all of my anatomical features, and get the right edges to the
leaves and all that sort of stuff, what I can do at this point would be to come
back in here with rubber cement, or any kind of liquid frisket and stop out on
the surface of that block with a frisket, with the things that were absolutely
necessary for that kind of technical rendering.
And then, I could come
back with a brush which is giving me a wash and paint directly over that. Okay?
Then, I can take that rubber cement and pull it up and it will have resisted
the washes and then I can have this nice spontaneous kind of drawing over it.
Another thing, I have this
little white pencil that I brought along and with me and if I want to extend
the black I simply draw into the black. This is still a little wet, so it's not
giving me a good black--[correcting himself] a good white--but see, I can draw
into it like that. And play around with it. And I will always try to repeat
something if I find something here that doing this, I'll try to get it--if it's
doing it white there--I'll try it some place else to get it to do the same in
black. You know, just for the helluvit.
Question:
Will that white, when you're going in with the white (unintelligible) ...
BM: Yes, yes you can.
Especially if you use this pencil. It's the only one the I've found that's
really good. This is a Prismacolor. white. It's kind of oily. And they work
very nicely.
Question:
(Inaudible question about reversing an image from left to right).
B M: What you what do
you do when you have a situation--the question is--that you have to be precise
in which way it faces, such as with letters. Because, obviously as soon as it's
printed, everything is backwards. You just have to draw it backwards, of
course. And that, sometimes, is quite tricky and it's amazing how many times
you'll find prints, even Durer's prints, have letters that are backwards. You
just forget.
Or else you'll put all the
letters backwards but you'll write it from left to right instead of right to
left. That happened a few times too. So, what I will do--this isn't tracing
paper, this is wrapping tissue but since I don't have any tracing paper this is
going to do--I will take, what happens there is this: okay, here's our well
now, I've made a peach so, I'm sorry. Take that and let's say it has the letter
E on it, okay? A nice, serif'd letter.
Then what I do is to take
that drawing, square it to the block, whether it I want it down here on the
block or up here on the block, I located here, this way. Once that done then I
make the typical cross mark here and here and that's all I will need. Then you
could turn it this way, locate those two keys again, and then take Scotch tape
and tape that drawing down with a piece of carbon paper underneath and then,
with hard pencil--in that case a 5H or 6H pencil.
Question:
It won't damage the wood?
BM: It won't damage
the wood, no not at all.
Question:
(Unintelligible)
BM: It is, well,
that's--the carbon really causes you trouble because the carbon dissolves when you
tone it.
Question:
(Unintelligible)
BM: And it's resistant
to the ink, too, and it's not very pleasant, but I've never been able to figure
any other way out. Except, perhaps real true carbon paper, which I have a hard
time finding and I never think about looking for it, so I use ordinary
"Carbon" paper--typewriter paper. So I think that for
artists--drawing is the basic craft that we all have in common and, you know,
there should be enough confidence in one's own drawing to be able to do it
without all those things.
The problem does come, as
you mentioned, in such things as letters which have to be turned backward, and
letters are one thing something that I just don't engrave. I try to avoid
engraving letters. The basic thing to remember, I think, about drawing is, one,
to relax and not worry about it. Certainly not to worry about, "God, it
doesn't look like him," you know, or things like that.
I mean, self portraits,
for those of you who don't do a lot of drawing, self portrait are, at first,
perhaps very difficult things to do because you feel a little self conscious
sitting in front of a mirror or looking at yourself in photographs so
intensely. And also, the tendency to make yourself prettier or uglier then you
are. But once you get over those things, the avenue of self-portraits is really
a nice way to work if you need something to work with.
All right, are there any
other questions? Okay, well, let's get about the business of making an
engraving. Once the drawing is done on the block, and it has reached a degree
of satisfaction, the next thing we have to do is get that surface other than
the color that it is. And we do that simply this way. I take a bit of etching
ink and squeeze out a few dots of ink on the surface. Like so.
A long time ago--ten years
ago--or 11 years ago now, I would always now take a rag with solvent, you know,
and wiped it. Well, I did that one time on a drawing that I'd spent a
considerable amount of time drawing and it erased the drawing! So, I decided
that would never happen again. So, I've not since then ever used any kind of
solvent or rags, but I just use Kleenex and move that etching ink around, like
so. And you see the drawing, still, through the brown ink.
The problem, one of the
problems inherent in this is that takes about four or five hours to set up,
actually longer than that, it takes overnight, generally, to set up. Before
it's dry enough so that you don't get ink all over your hands.
Question:
If you do it that way?
BM: If you do it this
way, yes. I always try to plan about twenty-four hours ahead. If I can.
Sometimes you can't.
Okay, now. Over here I
have a variety of tools. I think what I should do would be to go through the
tools themselves, first, and show you the ones that I find are of little or no
use. The first one that I find very little use for is this guy here, which is a
multi-lining tool. This tool has several teeth here at the bottom, and when it
is played into the wood, it cuts a whole series of parallel straight lines. And
there are probably a hundred lines per inch or a hundred-twenty lines to an
inch.
And this tool has--one,
two, three--this has seven lines. So I can cut seven parallel lines with one
go, this way. Which can make some rather interesting textures. I find them a
little bit too machine-like. They're just a little bit too regular for my
taste, I prefer seeing lines that are a little more irregular.
The other tool that I find
I don't find a lot of use for his this one, which is--I don't know if the
camera can get that or not--but it's a square-edged tool, it's called a
square-graver. And they only thing that it's good for is for cutting the inside
of right-angles. Because, as it cuts in, you see that what it leaves is a
right-angle. And it's very good for doing that, but that's about the only
thing.
The burin is the one that
most of you have, and there are several different sizes, but I don't understand
that--I've never understood why because they always come to the same
point. They always come to a 45-degree angle.
But I don't like the burin because it gently--this angle here is disturbing to
me. I don't like that kind of--I much prefer an angle that's much slighter. And
this is a burin of a lesser angle, and it's a very nice tool.
Its advantage is--once
again I'm not sure if the camera can get this--but its advantage is this: that
it will go in, it's like a brush, it will go in and a very slow, beginning, and
terminate in a very wide line.
Question:
. . . draw it on the paper.
BM: Yes, the line will
look like this. You see, it swells.
Observer:
Now draw the tip.
BM: Of the tip of the
tool? The tip of the tool would look like this. The square tool, which has a
point like this, will give you a line that simply does that. It's square on the
end. Okay?
The next tool that I will
show you is my favorite, is the round graver, and it looks like that. And it
gives you a line which is supposed to look like this. This is what the tool was
designed to do, to cut a line of regular width. But I can do this, with this,
and this, with this. And I can almost do this with this. Using my sliding
technique. So, I find the round gravers are by far the most usable or useful
tool.
Oh here's a nice little
tool to--or anything like this--very handy for being able to mark squares and
check the square ness of the block.
Question:
Do you get that at architectural firms?
BM: No, it's a
machinist's tool. Used for making--working with steel and metals and so forth.
And it will adjust to different angles. If you ever you want to do anything for
instance, like a straight line at an angle, you can do it a number of different
ways. One way is to take an ordinary engraving tool and pull it rather than
pushing it, and simply score the wood, and then remove it and then go back in
the other direction and it will follow itself perfectly well. It will make a
perfectly straight line.
Another thing you can do,
which is a lot faster, is to take an old dentists--[tool] for cleaning the
inside of your teeth--it's like a draw tool, a miniature draw tool. And put
that down and just pull it and it engraves a line, of course.
Question:
Is that sharpened?
BM: Yes. This tool
here is a very important tool to know. It is not an engraving tool as such; you
don't do any wood cutting with it. And this tool is sharpened on the belly--I
need to put my classes on because I can see what I'm doing--oil works better if
it's cut a little bit with kerosene. The tool is sharpened by--as all tools are
sharpened--by holding it upside down and flat against the stone and make sure
that it's seated all the way across, and not favoring to one side or the other
side, and then rotating in a circular motion. Like so.
Then, the important thing
about this tool is that it has to be sharpened by laying it absolutely flat
against the stone here in the oil. And then rotating it this way because what
this ends up being then, is, of course a plane. When you're engraving, you just
lay it flat and move it along this way on the surface and it takes off all the
burrs. That's its only purpose. It's called a chaser, a flat chaser. And that's
its only purpose.
Now, I did not bring with
me my other little tool because it just wouldn't make it here, and back--um, I
did bring it! I did bring it. There's that piece of glass, which is broken and
beveled, on three sides. Just drags across here. This will plane a block so
beautifully, it will take a drawing off. It will plane a drawing right off the
block.
Okay, now (unintelligible)
but I think it's important to take up right now and that is this: when I picked
the tool up, by the way, it's picked up this way, lay it down and simply pick
it up. With the palm of the hand coming right there then around, so that the
fingers are not underneath. So that when you lay it down that tool is still on
the surface of the wood. With your little finger's cupped back, see that bunion
pad there that keeps the figures from getting blisters on it.
But you really don't need,
you can actually cup your fingers under quite comfortably as long as you're
working on small blocks, but as soon as your figures come out onto the surface
of the block, then you have to cup them back. Okay?
Didn't talk about the bag,
did I?
The bag is two pieces of
leather, filled with sand--which is spilling out over the table. When you're
having one of these made, just take two pieces of leather, have the leather
smith sew them up and leave about an inch un-sewn. That way you can stick a
funnel in it, and then fill it up with sand had then you yourself can go ahead
and sew it up, finish up the sewing.
The function of the bag is
to hold the block and not let the block slip. You can manipulate--sand is
coming out all over, I feel like I've gone to Florida! You can form the bag,
push it over into a different kinds of attitudes and the block will stay where
you put it. It gives you something to push against as well. So, that's the
function of the bag. The block sits on top of the bag, held by the left hand and--if
you're right-handed--held by the right hand if you’re left-handed. And then the
cutting is done in this manner.
Now there's nothing more,
but then there are these variations, you see, that happen, and all the little
details about how to cut certain things. For instance, when there is an area
that is important in an engraving, one should never cut toward that area. If
there is a line that is important, then the cutting should always proceed away
from that line.
For instance, right here,
if I want to maintain the integrity of this black shape, I will never cut this
way, toward it. I will first of all, cut around it, and then I will do all of
my other work away from it. That prevents that slip--if I happen to slip now I
will slip out into negative space and not ruin the drawing.
I think what I will do
right now is cut this line that goes from this point right here and I'll put a
white dot there and I'll put a white dot here. Now, many people will perceive
that as being a fairly simple line, but what I would like for you to watch is
how many different positions this hand will go into, following the gesture of
every contour of that little line, that goes from that point to this point.
Now, I'm going to do it with a simple round graver, with a line that does not
vary in width. And it will go this way.
Notice first of all that
the lines have to go in that direction, so my hand wants to cut in that
direction. That's very easy for me to do. This is very awkward for me to do.
Therefore, I want my hand always to be in the same position, cutting in an
attitude that is comfortable for it. Cut to there, then extended to here and
cut out, and then back to here. Then to here. Now I'm ‘gonna shut up . . .
[Moser's voice trails of as he mumbles something about he can't talk and do
this at the same time].
Now this, you see, is
going to be an inside curve and so it curves this way. See that end turn? Now,
at this point I've a long straight cut. I'll put the burr off, I'll just clip
it off at the end. And now I will start to cut that's going to be all the way
to this end with this hand. When that happens, this is what I do: I cut a
little ways, then I relax and move the index finger forward. And then forward,
and then move forward and forward. Now, I've got another contour change. Again,
there. And then a contour here, then move, then another contour change there,
and then to there.
Okay? Now that line is
sufficient for me to cut into or away from. I can cut widening that line this
way until I move safely away from the image area. Or, I can re-enter the line,
and that's simply means going back into it with a wider tool. Now, the other
technique that I wanted to show you and the one that I was talking about last
night is the technique of sliding the tool, changing the attitude. You see, in
cutting ordinarily with the tool, the axis of this tool--right through
there--stays perpendicular to the surface of the engraving block. What I have
discovered was is that if I turn the tool to its side, you see, and start to
push slowly and then right it . . . and then right it and then out again, that
way, see what kind of mark it gives me?
I'll do another one. Let
me get a bigger tool. Turn it to its side, and start to cut and then to the
right, and then as I pull the tool out rotate it once again to the left . . .
it gives me that kind of line. A very calligraphic line. Isn't that nice? And
then you would do it this way, and swing it that way and then off again. You
can do all kinds of wonderful things.
I'm trying to engrave a
tonality. I have to use parallel lines, right? So that's about all I can do, or
I can do it that way or I can do it this way. Which is simply using a white dot
technique, or a stippling technique. Or, you can do it this way, to, you know,
with the marks, that's the line, the mark and dot thing that was talking about
in drawing and has been translated over to engraving.
Then, again, you can do
the same thing with black dots, you see because the if I were doing an
engraving with nothing but white dots, the there would be some areas or enough
passages in the print which I would very carefully engrave around black dots,
so that I would have black dots standing out as well as white dots so that I
have that contrast, that balance of black and white.
So, to start with, instead
of using a [number] four, let's go down to a two-and-a-half [size of his tools]
and I can draw these lines--engrave these lines--and that's the kind of line
which is very characteristic of engraving. You notice that in Durer's
engravings, for instance, you'll notice that the lines are curved most of the
time? And here's your reason, you see, because as this hand stays still, and
the block turns, the natural line is the one that's the easiest to do is the
one that's curved.
Comment:
It takes a lot more energy to cut a straight line . . .
BM: It takes a lot
more energy to cut a straight line than it does to cut a curved line. Because
you just slide that in, you get two to four times as much distance out of a single
cut in a curved line as cutting a straight line. Then what I do is to re-enter
each one of those lines. You think that I'm not telling you the truth [Moser
says this facetiously to one of the members of the group, then . . .] I'm
telling you the truth, but this is the truth. [They chuckle.]
Now I'll go into the line
cut by the two-and-a-half and I'll let this slide in and slide in, slide out,
slide in, slide out, slide in, slide out, slide in, slide out, slide in. [The
group sounds appreciative]. And then I'll start another line let's say right
there where it starts to widen out--there's too much of a gap there, so it's
going to be too dark--that's the point where I'll come in with my lozenge.
Which is the sharp-pointed tool and I'll start that right in here, and use it
in its traditional usage to do that, you see. Go down and up and down again.
And so I get it to the
width that a two-and-a-half will start, and now I'll cut a straight line in,
then we re-enter with a three, swell that out and swell that up and down and up
and down. Now, if you think about that, how long it takes to do that and then
you think about prints that are this big, and it's all done like that you
think, "My God, you know," and then I told you last night that I cut that
block . . . (the sound of thunder outside obscures is his words).
Comment:
You need to be a workaholic.
BM: Oh, no, definitely
I'm not a workaholic but, . . . . how many of them, do you want me to finish
one of these? I can finish this guy in about ten minutes. Okay, so what I'm
going to do is finish engraving that guy right there. Okay? This section right
here, behind this creature's eye, this section here this shape, I'll do that in
a tone that let's say about 50%. Fifty-percent is gray.
What I will do will come
down to a two-and-a-half, then I'll start with--well I have to decide, first of
all, which direction I want to cut those lines? If I want to cut in this
description, or do I what to cut them in that direction, this direction or what
direction? I think what I want to his emphasize the eye so what I will do is
start a line that will curve down that way. And then I'll parallel that with
another one. And then I'll parallel that with another one.
My mother told me one time
when I was a kid, she's said, "Son, remember," I was scrambling eggs
one morning, "You know, you can always put more salt in but you can never
take it out." Well, that is one of those Serendipitous little statements
that lives on in my memory because, you know, if I want this to be all white, I
can cut all these lines out later. But if I don't want it all white and I want
a gray tone in there, I bloody well can't.
Now I'm about to tell you
another little story. And that is that, you notice as I'm cutting this thing,
my left hand not only manipulates the block, but see that? That finger coming
back through, like that? Well, occasionally this doesn't get out of the way,
and that's a mess! Hit the end of your finger with that tool which is so bloody
sharp.
Now, here's a slide cut.
See, instead of going to a smaller tool, which would be to go to a
two-and-a-half, cut, and then change, I've just become so lazy in my middle age
that I just to slide that tool over to the side and then right it again and it
does the same thing with that one tool to cut that would ordinarily take two or
three tools to do.
Is this enough? Why don't
we stop this madness and let me show you one final little thing. Could you hand
me that Dremel under there, please? Now, once I've come to this point, then I
need to clear away--okay, I need to change the bit on this tool--because this
is a router bit. No, I'll tell you what. Before I change it, I want to show you
what it's for. This fits in here like so. [Sound of the Dremel tool motor].
Question:
What's that thing called?
BM: A router. Router
bit. And that just takes at block right down, and makes it flat and if you're
printing with a big printing press with those rollers, there's nothing sticking
up. You check out this, and it's all irregular in there and the rollers have a
tendency to picked up on that sort of thing.
Question:
Do you ever draw with that . . . ?
BM: Ah, yeah, every
now and again I get carried away. But, yeah, this is a nice little device here.
Dremel makes them. That's in Racine, Wisconsin and you can order them direct.
And the only bits that are workable are the steel bits. [Motor noise drowns out
his words). This is dangerous, [as he lifts his glasses off and onto his
forehead] but I can't see . . .. (he's barely audible).
But what I will do occasionally,
I'll use it to cut a contour, like at the bottom of that line.
But, I warn you, if you
ever buy one of these by yourself a pair of those Mickey Mouse ears [ear
protectors] because--I don't have to worry about it anymore because it's
already ripped out about 10 percent of my nerves in my ears--that high
frequency noise will damage your hearing irreparably. Because it's nerve damage
So, the next thing is to
print the block, but I need a slab to roll out. This is a good brayer, I bought
it in London at Mr. Lawrence's place, with brass fittings and all. It's
amazing. Now, I'll tell you now I did not bring any printing ink with me, I'm
going to try the etching ink. There's no reason why--letterpress is what you
should use if you can.
Nine out of ten printing
errors in printing a block come from over-inking. So, you really don't need
very much ink. Now, first thing is to roll out the ink. Roll out a line of ink
on a brayer and listen to it. And make sure that you're always counter-rolling,
picking up and putting back down, picking up and putting down, so that you're
not picking up ink here and putting it back over here and then putting it from
over here to over here to here to here. You know, by doing this.
Roll it, pick it, roll it,
pick it up roll it back and forth, counter it this way, then back and forth,
until you spread it out. You see how that little bit of ink I had there, see
how big an area its now printing out? Rolling out nice and thin, and then it's
just simply a matter of rolling over, in two or three different directions.
It's better to put three or four coats or layers on that block--thin ones--than
to put down one thick one. It would be better to roll it out until its, you
know, scrape that off, clean that off and just use that amount of ink and
spread that out again.
Now, paper. You can print
a wood engraving on almost any kind of paper. So, if you're going to be hand
rubbing, your best bet is to use some fine Japanese papers. This is a real nice
little sheet called kitakata. Anybody know the kitakata? Nice little paper, and
it's cheap, which makes it even nicer. It costs only 19 cents a sheet or
something like that for a handmade paper. And it's a simple matter of putting
it down and making certain that it doesn't move.
Now, there are a variety
of things that can be used to rub a print. One thing that can be used is the
back of a fingernail; you can use the back of the fingernail, there are barens
that are, you know, Oriental rubbers and all that sort of thing. And you see,
when you do this, you can read the print from the back. You can see the whole
thing right through.
Let's try another block,
one that's got more surface. This one should work quite well. I'm going to try
another paper this time. This was the kitakata, this is sekishu. It's a little
more expensive. First thing I'm doing is just making sure it's flat all the way
around and that should keep it from moving too much.
It's a funny thing. I'm
sitting here now feeling like I'm a bloody idiot! Because I'm doing something I
never do. I never to this. I never sit and rub--I rubbed big wood blocks,
that's it. I never rub these things, I just handed to McGrath [the press man],
he prints it and I see the proofs. Spoons, of course, are the old traditional
tools for this, but believe me, this old rubber here is tops.
But you notice I'm rubbing
into it, you see, that it prints all the way through. But be careful when doing
this to always rub on a solid, because if you don't you'll slip, go out of here
and it will rip the paper. And then everything else you've done is for naught.
Let's see what happens to
that now with another paper. I'll rub the same print--the same block--with a
different paper. I'll try the kitakata again.
Question:
I notice that you're going to a particular side of the paper.
BM: Yeah, the kitakata
as a distinct side, there is a felt side and coated side... (To a question
about this preference) No, I favor the smoother side. The sekishu now, is
probably for or five times as expensive as the kitakata, but I think you can
see that this print, as compared to that one I just pulled, you'll see a
remarkable difference.
And then were going to
stop this and go do something else. See, it's a lot different. And that has to
do not with the printer but with the paper. So the choice of the paper is a
very critical. Okay, so let's takes us through pretty near the whole process.
Are there any questions?
This is the end of the
transcription.
Note: You can still get the videotape on VHS.
Contact ritchie@seanet.com for current
information, pricing, etc. Ritchie’s video is at work trying to find ways to
convert the archives (there are about sixty videotapes on printmaking and
related subjects) to digital video and, from there, to a printmaking DVD
magazine. Most videotapes are sold for a dollar-a-minute on VHS, plus shipping
and handling and, for Washington State residents, sales tax. The obstacle at
this time is conversion of the video to digital upgrade, new titles, etc. Moser
has been featured in other videotapes, with higher production quality. He was
recently part of a feature on collector’s books, for example. Ritchie’s cannot,
unfortunately, help you get those programs. His Web site is Penny Royal Press