The Landscape of Painting

Drypoint by Eva Springer

Drypoint print | Eva Springer

My great aunt, Eva Springer, was born in Cimarron, New Mexico in the 1880′s. She earned a BA degree from Highlands University in Las Vegas, New Mexico; attended Columbia University, and then the Art Students League, where she studied with Kenneth Hayes Miller and William Foote. Later, in Paris she attended the Academies Julian, Grande Chaumiere, Sultan, and Delecluse. When she returned to America, she lived her life as an artist in New York, Washington, DC, Philadelphia and back to New Mexico.

Eva was a serious artist, showing at the Paris Salon, the London Academy, Art Institute of Chicago, the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, among others. Her specialty later in her life was miniature watercolor portraits on ivory. These collected miniatures comprised one of the main exhibits at the Museum of New Mexico for several years, and was included in a show at the Smithsonian Institution years later. She died in 1962.

Source: Who Was Who in American Art by Peter Hastings Falk

I can’t read the title of this print, but her technique for this portrait was drypoint. This technique is in some ways not dissimilar from scratch board (see my earlier post for a mention of this medium) in that the artist is digging into the material to reveal the lines of the drawing rather than placing the lines, as with drawing. The lines of the image are scratched directly into a plate of copper or tin with a special needle in a wooden handle. Where the minuscule needle gouges the plate, rough edges are created, sort of like plowing a field. This wave-like shape is called the burr, and it’s these edges which help to hold the ink. The drypoint technique produces prints with velvety, somewhat diffuse lines.

I’ve tried this technique myself, and it’s really tough to get a satisfactory result. As you draw you have to sort of look at the plate at an angle to see what you’re drawing, because you’re scratching, not leaving a color behind, as in an ink drawing. And if you screw up, there’s little chance you’ll successfully be able to make a correction. Then add the difficulties of properly inking the plate and then making a good print. Not for whiners like me.

The effect in Eva’s print is like filming an aging starlet with Vasoline on the lens to soften the lines on the face. The final work looks rather romantic, and very beautiful.

Tags: printmaking

This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 6th, 2009 at 8:38 am and is filed under Influential artists. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.