Drawing with the Needle in Etching

Drawing with the Needle in Etching

Etching is an intaglio printing process where lines are incised into the matrix to hold ink. Unlike more direct intaglio processes where grooves are directly incised into the plate with a stylus, the Maker applies pressure to the etching needle to break through the surface of the resist as seen in the video. In this step, the Maker maps out where lines will be “bitten” into the plate by acid, which will eventually hold the ink during printing.   

Human agency is at its most concentrated in this stage of the etching process. The Maker forms the initial composition with an etching needle; the acid, ink, paper, and press have not yet been engaged. The closest analogy to this stage of etching is the act of drawing with a pen. During the Etching Revival of the late nineteenth century, critics described etching as a medium unencumbered by labor which could transparently reflect the intellect of the artist. Flow between hand and etching needle was thought to mirror the relationship between mind and pen in poetic writing. Varied pressure applied to a pen or pencil in drawing is often said to capture the unconscious expression of the Maker, resulting in the accumulation of media on the paper’s malleable surface. While drawing adds media, etching involves the removal of resist to reveal the bright, metallic plate underneath. While the movement of the etching needle seems unconstrained like drawing with a pen, there is a subtle friction created between the metal stylus, resist, and metal plate underneath, resulting in a soft scraping sound. The simultaneous resemblance to and reversal of the drawing process can be disorienting, leading the Maker to dig into the plate itself in an attempt to produce a clear image.

The construction of a legible image through subtraction requires the Maker to think abstractly. The Maker must maintain consistent relationships between networks of scratched lines. The location of each mark needs to be calculated to balance the dark and light formed by ink and paper. If lines are too far apart, the image becomes flat and unintelligible. If the lines drawn too close together, they can collapse into a single, wide mass unable to hold ink. The Maker balances these relationship while producing the image in reverse,  anticipating the mirroring between inked-plate and paper produced during the printing stage. The Maker negotiates these varied dimensions of abstraction to produce a network of incised, inked channels that read as a range of tones and volumes in the final print.

 – Christine Garnier, PhD Student, Harvard University

Additional Resources:

Martha Tedeschi, “The New Language of Etching in Nineteenth-Century England." In The "writing" of modern life : the etching revival in France, Britain, and the U.S., 1850-1940, edited by Elizabeth Helsinger, 25-37 (Chicago, Ill. : Smart Museum of Art, University of Chicago, 2008).