Love In Vain part 11

 

I had some time today, and the weather was unseasonably mild, so a good day to go to the Studio and take care of a few things.  I wanted to get a better proof of my short (accurate) version of Love In Vain done, in case I need it for this project soon, plus I had a few questions about the possible woodcut class that was discussed up there, plus a few other stops to make on the way up that had nothing to do with art.  Over the weekend I had received the official email about classes being offered up at JSAC, starting next week.  That was a little soon for me, so I decided not to put in for one, and wait for the spring. Last I heard, Jeanne wants me to send her something, and I figured the easiest for me was my class proposal from the last time I taught this at that location.  However, that was a four meeting class.  This one I got recently mentioned classes beginning next week and going through early April. That seemed like more than six weeks, the length of all those scheduled, so I wrote it all out, and it turned out to be more like 13 weeks.  Perhaps this includes a second session. And maybe there's a week off between sessions, or they are closed for a holiday.  And back when I taught this previously, we had a separate materials fee, paid directly to me, which allowed me to buy what the class needed.  I looked up some prices online last night, and this would save everyone who takes the class 30 or 40 bucks.  Unfortunately, Jeanne wasn't in today (heard she has a daughter getting married soon). so this will have to wait.  Not a problem as I'm not part of the first session, so nothing is going to happen before late February the earliest.  

All that settled, I got to work.  I noticed the sink was now drained, so I could wash my hands and tools there, which made my life easier.  No sign of Molly, or that she had been there the past week.  Not a problem either way.  My ink had been in the car, but in this warm weather, it was fine.

My goal was to print a better shortened copy of my Love In Vain print. My experiment more or less worked last time, in that I knew my idea for solving the problem would work, but I had issues with the proof.  Didn't like the adjustment to the woman's face, and there was a big smudge of ink in the left side margin of the paper.  The paper itself was a little small, big enough for the proof, and to take an early photo to send Tom, but not acceptable for the final version, at least as far as I was concerned.  Unfortunately, on my way up there, I realized I should have taken my cutting tools with me.  I didn't have them, which meant I'd have to find an alternative to cutting the face some more.

One of the things I did last week was go through my pop/rock book and check it against the blog to see what music I had played there at the Studio since everything had been put into storage.  Turned out I had 3 discs in that book, two in my jazz/blues book, and a few in the car that I used to listen to on my long commutes to the university, but I hadn't been going anywhere that far in a long time.  Based on that, today I started with One For the Road, a live double album from the Kinks. A mix of old classics, and a bunch of newer work that seems to point to this show promoting the Low Budget album.  The band was at its hard rocking best, so it's a good album.  Some of the older songs sounded much like they always had, some had different arrangements than the original record. For example, the new live version of Till the End of the Day played up the ska rhythms much more than the original version.  I don't know what the original intention was. I know that in that early 60's time, the Beatles also had some songs with west Indian rhythms, but they were definitely subdued.  Was this new version of the Kinks song what they always wanted, or was this a new take on an old song?  I don't know enough about the song to say.

This was now the third printing of the Love in Vain block, so inking did not take long.  It still had the pieces of tape that protected the paper from the inch and a half of unwanted block, so I set those aside before inking (replaced with inky tape), then rolled it up with the same Outlaw Black I have been using.   As for the woman's face, after inking, I covered a bit of it with more painter's tape.  Not my original plan, but it seemed to do the trick.  Results can be seen below:

In general I am satisfied with how it turned out, so I am going to declare this one done.  I don't know how these will be signed yet, but I'm sure I will hear that from Tom eventually.  The Kinks disc ended as I finished printing, so as I cleaned up, I was listening to another from my list of unplayed discs- Beat This, a best of collection from the English Beat.  (my understanding is that there was band in America called "The Beat", so the English band had to change their name) This is a more obvious ska, and arranges as such, but still very enjoyable. My conclusion was that I should have listened to both these albums a lot more than I had.

On my way out, I stopped by the office again, to show Elyse the 2nd proof of the print, so she could see what I spent the time replacing.  Plus a preview of what I planned to exhibit as part of the next tenant show, assuming I find the right frames for them and some mats.  She liked the print, thinking it had both aspects of a period piece, and also not.  That's fine, as the piece is meant to be somewhat universal, related to today as much as Johnson's time in the 1930's.  Plus it left Elyse with a desire to know more about Robert Johnson and the song.  Could't ask for more than that.