Early on in the year I did a B&W, 4.5 x 5, covid inspired print titled ‘Passing Storm’. As we know the ‘storm’ has been what the weather folks would call a ‘very slow moving disturbance.’
When effective vaccines were announced I did a more hopeful, 5.5 x 8 print I’ve titled ‘2012, the view from here.’
Hopefully a bright, cheerful addition will be warranted very soon :- )
I love the incredible solids that engraving allows and I have a ‘thing’ about prints showing falling objects. With this print I indulged myself on both accounts. I named it ‘Night Fall.’
Stretching up the east side of Georgian Bay is an archipelago called the ‘30,000 Islands’. I haven’t counted them but viewed from an airplane it seems there could be that many.
However, if you’re still out in a canoe after dusk the 30,000 become one large, never ending island and good luck finding the island you camped on. That meal you’re longing for is there just waiting to be cooked and eaten :- )
A favourite Christmas print, my youngest daughter’s first limited edition. She drew, dad engraved and we pulled a proof. She coloured it in, dad engraved plates for the colours then we printed.
Santa has grown chubbier since then; dad, not quite as much. She’s still quite cute!
One morning I canoed out into a thick fog and down a wide channel towards open water. When I left the channel and headed towards the shore islands slowly began to appear out of the fog. It was quite magical.
This is a 27×14.5 cm, five colour reduction print.
I had a spatula of dark ink after cleaning up from printing and ‘painted’ this tree with it. I liked the tree so I created a background for it. 
Here’s a great show that features engravers, small letterpress printshops, unbelievable bookbinding and many related artisans as well as printing ephemera and books.
….and us, Raven Press.
Come early, see the show then take a hike along a wooded trail on top of the nearby Niagara Escarpment!
I editioned this years ago but something about it always bugged me so it was relegated to a drawer. Two weeks ago I sliced a lot of roadway from the bottom of the plate and all of a sudden the eye was drawn to the barn, not the road!
These are printed in black with an image area of 35.5×58.5 cm (14×23″).
These hay pulleys ran along a track near the peak of the barn roof. The bottom pulley clipped onto a large fork that dropped down and stuck into loose hay on the wagon just in from the field. The rope was attached to a team of horses that would pull the hay up to where it could be dropped into the loft. Hot, dusty, sweaty work.
This is a four colour print with an image area 28 x 34 cm (11×14.5 inches)
A brief respite from a slow going, very detailed engraving. A small, 2 colour engraving of a nude. It’s a closeup because I do a terrible job of faces, and hands, and feet…and other parts as well. 
At last night’s show I tried to explain how the plates were printed and used. I didn’t have any sample bits there to make it easy to explain so I’m posting these pics which, hopefully, explain it all.
The bulk of my engraving is done with ‘V’ shaped knives like the one shown but on these plates I used a drimmel in order to get more organic looking shapes. The inset pic shows how everything BUT the image is cut away.
The progressive sheet shows how a three colour print comes together.
This is a great show if you’re interested in letterpress printing and the related arts. If you make it, be sure to drop by our booth.
This was my entry into the Tarot Lovers show, a (somewhat cynical :- ) three colour engraving.
A lot of great Art and Artists in Elora next weekend, July 8 & 9. Cool downtown complete with The Elora Brew Pub to visit after the show if, perchance, you feel like imbibing a local brew or buying one for a (somewhat) local printmaker.
A few posts ago I had a sketch of some rock in the north end of the Georgian Bay; here’s a nine colour, 9×12 engraving from that sketch. Sit still long enough to sketch and birds come by, turtles, lizards and snakes poke their heads out from hiding and, usually, an enormous ant takes a bite of some bit of exposed butt cheek.
clive lewis, printmaker 