Monoprints, ghost prints and ink jet prints

In the last post I included a photograph of the large (full sheet of Fabriano Rosapina if you're interested) thread prints I've been making.  I ink up a large piece of acetate and lay sewing thread, strand by strand, on the plate.  I have the time taken to get the threads on the plate down to about an hour, sometimes it is boring, other times it is pleasingly meditative.  Then I take the print and a ghost print.

I am currently using the ghost prints as bases for ink jet prints of images from the factory.

Here is a selection of the work to date.

full size print

detail

 

 

 

 

 

 

ghost print

detail

 

 

inkjet prints on ghost prints

Amann analogue

I also took my analogue SLR camera into the factory with me.  (I think it is strange that we now have to specify a camera as analogue because the noun 'camera' invariably implies a digital camera).  It is a Canon Eos 300 and feels as light as a feather compared to my SLR digital camera.  It takes wonderful photographs and I love the shutter sound.  In fact I take photographs just to hear the shutter sound.  Another beauty of film is also that you often have a few frames left at the end of film that 'need to be used up' and this encourages a creative recklessness that sometime has good results. 

I develop these photographs in the college and really enjoy this process as well.  The dark room holds no fear for me thanks to  Emily Robards who held my hand through the developing of several films until I knew what I was doing.  And thanks to the hairy drying cabinet most of the negatives get little hairs and specks on them which replicates amazingly well the atmosphere in the factory which was always filled with cotton and polyester fibres flying about the place.  This is called, not unsurprisingly, 'fly'.

These films are 'push processed'.  The ISO is set much higher than the ISO rating of the film itself so the film is deliberately underexposed.  This is then compensated for during the developing of the film.  It helps in the low light levels of the factory and also gives these really evocative, high contrast, grainy results.

These cameras are available on Ebay for ridiculously low prices.  That makes me sad for some reason.

chairs in the meeting room

reception

pre-spinning

cctv (still active) in the reception

reception entrance

employee entrance and exit - the most unwelcome and welcome sight

heavy twisting

filament quality lab

spinning quality lab

entrance gate

from core yarn twisting into pre-spinning

no caption required

meeting room

employee car park

left behind

view through reception window

 

 

 

At the end of one of these films, I took a few photographs of the plate I've been using to make some large thread prints and one of the prints themselves