5 finger etching and sketching

 

A single line is a wonderful thing. A single line can contain the whole world. If you see a line, you see the motivation of the person you did it, is the line controlled, is the line free, fast, careful, aggressive, full of emotion, fragile, straight and and and …..

If we hold a pen, we usually write, we control, we usually do not give off. And if we start to learn how to draw, this controlled line is so extrem in our subconsciousness, that the process to become emotional, when drawing a line, is for most people hard work.

But there is a wonderful trick to understand the difference.

Take 5 pencils of the same hardness, f.e. 2B. Stick one pencil on every finger with tape. If you do not want to loose the flexibility of your fingers, stick them with the tape directly on the fingernails. So the pencils are the extensions of the fingers.

Now take a huge piece of paper, put it on a flat underground, put on the most wonderful and excessive music, loud, and let the fingers dance on the paper and while doing this, the pencils leave wonderful lines. Try to react on the music. Try to vary the lines, short  and never-ending ones, massive and fragile ones, single ones and concentrations of lines.

This way to „draw“ is so extremely emotional, when you start to understand the process. Just enjoy what happens. There is no wrong and right.

This little piece of art is done more or less in this way. I did it with etching needles instead of pencils directly on a metal plate. And I used three different plates, so three different colors, I printed one over the other.

This work is no part of a limited edition, but it is a single artwork. The size of the plate is 20×20 cm and the size of the paper ca. 28×39 cm. And if you want to have this work for your collection, it is available for 90 €.

By the way if you want to repeat the process with the etching needles and the needles are  attached to your fingers, do not even try to get something out of your trousers pocket, I tried it and this is really hurting and dangerous! 😉