Week four - repetiton

 36 photographs and 12 diagrams

Mel Bochner at the Whitechapel Art Gallery - I find his reworking of his older pieces more interesting than his word paintings. 36 photographs and 12 diagrams photographs little wooden blocks in plan elevation and isometric, together with a corresponding diagram for each arrangement. It is a series of images,exploring repetition,  which when viewed together enable us to reconstruct the original sculpture. 

Four Smears: 1968/2010

Four smears is a process of photographing photographs, displayed in pairs of positive and negative, both in form and colour. "Photography is shown to be a process which self-produces new images rather than one which records exiting objects in from of the camera..." (Whitechapel blurb on Four Smears: 1968/2010)

Surface Dis/Tension (Recursive)

Also, Surface Dis/Tension (Recursive) 2012, where Bochner has rephotographed a wet and crumpled print investigating perspective, and hung it out to dry. He has printed it as both positive and negative again. The images have been laid on top of each other, but slightly out of kilter. 

I'm interested in his use of repetition and photography. Pushing the large lino pieces a little further, I decided to reprint them, on top of each other, but waiting for each layer to dry. Printed the first block four times to get four multiple coloured prints.

first block inked up in yellow

all four prints, first layer, in drying rack

second layer added 

I don't think the first layer was dry enough  as some of the yellow bled through. What a lengthy process!  All prints were numbered so the same order would be carried out each time. Note: registration method crucial here. (Last week's print wasn't registered properly - in particular because the lino ins't cut square). Paper was blotted between two sheets of damp tissue - tried without damping but result was no good.

third colour added

fourth/final colour

fourth/final colour with more extender