Where Photography Meets Watercolor: Exploring Van Dyke Photography

August 23, 2023

This summer, I took a class on Van Dyke Photography. Van Dyke printing, also known as Van Dyke brown process, is an alternative photographic printing process that produces brown-colored prints. The process dates back to the 19th century, and is named after the Flemish painter Anthony van Dyck, for the rich tonality of the browns. The effect is ephemeral: a splash of pigment infused with an image.

Van Dyke printing is a contact printing method that prints to the size of the negative, following this process:

Coating the Paper: A paper or other suitable substrate is coated with a solution containing ferric ammonium citrate and tartaric acid. This creates a light-sensitive emulsion.
Drying: The coated paper is allowed to dry in the dark.
Contact Printing: A negative is placed directly onto the coated paper, and the combination is exposed to UV light. The areas of the paper not blocked by the negative will be exposed to light, while the areas under the negative remain unexposed. I used a UV light box in a darkroom, however a sunlight exposure would also work.
Development: The exposed paper is developed by washing it in water. This process causes the ferric ammonium citrate to reduce to a brown ferric oxide, creating the characteristic brown color associated with the method.
Fixing: After the print is developed, it is fixed with a sodium thiosulfate solution to make the image permanent. For many of my prints, I fixed the images again with a gold-toning solution, which is a mixture of Ammonium Thiocyanate and Gold Chloride Solution (purchased at Bostick & Sullivan). This reduces the richness of the brown, and increases the longevity of the prints. Van Dyke prints are light sensitive and should be kept out of direct light. The gold-toning helps helps them last a lot longer.

The prints I used in this process were intimate photographs I took of objects in my room, as well as photographs of expressive ruins. I hope you enjoy them.

Berlin Photo Album

November 23, 2022

I recently visited a dear friend living in Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg in Berlin. As an artist, so much inspiration is gleaned from being in different worlds and taking in the different sights and sounds. We drank coffee, we made drawings, I met some wonderful people and went see to the Kathe Kollwitz Musuem. It was exquisite. I’m happy to post some of the pictures we took as a future bookmark of inspiration.

Summer Update & New Paintings — Welcome Fall

September 12, 2021

After a long and rewarding summer, I am happy to share some quick updates, adventures, and drawings. I recently came back from a camping trip in Stephentown, New York. Stephentown is a cute little town that lays right on the New York- Massachusetts border. There were numerous rasberry-laden trails near to our campgrounds, a cattle farm, in addition to a beautiful lake to go swimming. I found a lot of inspiration just sitting by the fire and reading George Eliot, listening to the catbirds squawking away in the distance.

Whenever I travel upstate and I am reminded that all the Northeast looked this way prior to cities, infrastructure... And tarmac. It is really amazing, City streets are ovens in the summer. Imagine how it would feel beneath a forest. As we walked around nature—yellow flowers seemed to be everywhere.

I like the feeling that comes, the moment one steps into the woods, and one's cellphone falls out of service… When the atmosphere shifts and a strange noise is heard: "yo—what’s that?” It’s then when one’s sense of mystery returns and your mind departs from safety and into alertness primed by imagination (Thankfully, it isn't a bear). I love the smell of campfire, I love watching the stars and distant planets in the darkness.

I did some traveling, as well. And, in my usual way, took the time to learn how to do a lot of things. Like, grow fresh tomatoes and basil from my fire escape, to make infinite Caprese salads. I got into leather restoration and fixing the sleeves on my brother’s ruined jackets. I spend a lot of evenings learning chords on the guitar, which is nice to do while working through problems in my head. And let’s not forget the endless adventures afforded to me on my bicycle traveling between boroughs—the Williamsburg Bridge and the Marine Parkway Bridge towards Far Rockaway being my personal favorites. My most ambitious ride was one I made from Queens through the Northshore of Long Island. Cultural consumption: Old Hollywood films, banned 18th-century French novels, Muddy Waters, “The Eyes of Laura Mars.”

I've been finding a lot of inspiration making color studies of some of the artists whose color palettes are currently interesting to me, like Paul Gauguin and Picasso. while my work generally tends to follow a more muted palette, a part of my growth recently has been a more careful consideration of color, and the language they communicate. My transition from water-based mediums like gouache to oil-based mediums introduced to me a completely different methodology in overlaying color, which has me reconsidering how I was doing it before. My personal style is reflecting this change, too. Bright orange scarves, celadon caftans, and magenta blouses are flooding my closet.

I’m sharing here some pictures from upstate, the paintings I made in a class, my work area, alongside some narratives I am working on involving a beach, a haunting. I feel like the best part about working, are the in between stages when you do not know what is going to happen, and you are following your intuition to get to the other side. Looking forward to filling you all in on what is happening next!

Studio Update: Honoré Daumier’s “The Burden” (1851)

May 11, 2021

I mentioned earlier this year that I began oil painting for the first time. While the first few weeks felt like I was sailing blindly in the dark, I am happy to say, I found a middle ground painting a copy of Honoré Daumier’s “The Burden” (1851).** I did not approach painting with the intention of producing an exact likeness of the original piece, instead opting to make it more chromatic. But I began first by creating an outline, utilizing the grid method, and then overlaying different colors.

Daumier was a painter, sculptor and printmaker who made his living making caricatures in mid-19th century France. His paintings were considered radical for his time, because they depicted the working class people of Paris working, commuting and engaging in leisure. He often got himself into hot water through his scathing attacks on the bourgeoise, the church, politicians, and the monarchy. He was jailed for several months for an unflattering depiction he made of King Louis-Philippe.

What I really love about the period of art history Daumier beckons from, is the expressiveness of the palette. I picture, looking at his work, a world filled with smoke, lit by gas and candlelight. In “The Burden,” you see a woman carry a heavy load of laundry, in the company of a small child. There is both a strong narrative and feeling of pathos, as the pair embarks on a Herculean journey through a barren landscape. You almost get a feeling of heroism watching the laundress perform her daily routine.

I think what I appreciated most about copying this painting was observing what little attention Daumier paid to the subject’s faces. The laundress’ eyes are just a few expressive lines, but you are visually drawn towards the sensitive gesture of hands, and her neck that cranes forward in a swanlike movement.

Hopefully, in the next few weeks, I will be ready to share with you all some of the new paintings I am working on. I have been refraining from posting my progress shots to give myself a little more freedom to change and revise. I am looking forward to crossing that bridge and sharing those new pieces.

**This painting was made in the Post-Impressionist Painting Techniques online class at the Teaching Studios of Art.

2018 - 2021

/ My Journey from Prints to Paintings

Art Presentation: My Journey from Prints to Paintings: 2018-2021

April 06, 2021

Last month, I was approached by a colleague who asked if I would be interested in presenting my artwork to some people I work with. I immediately affirmed “Yes—I would!” without considering what I would actually be presenting about. It suddenly dawned on me following my enthusiasm of a new project, that I never once thought about how to talk about my work. I spent the next few days thinking about the art I made over the last few years to draw together some kind of connection. For instance: what are the themes I constantly revisit time and time again? I decided to organize my concepts in a timeline, which I then presented to my coworkers March 17th.

2018

The main focus of work I made this year was expanding my understanding of lithography. In 2018, I began carving out a space for lithography, spending time travelling between home, my job in the Flatiron district and the lithography studio at the Art Students League. The prints I made there became the basis of a show that carried over into 2019. What I enjoyed the most about this time was experimenting with different methods, and learning from experienced lithographers who watched me like a hawk, ensuring no designs were lost to an unlevel stone or insufficient etch.

2019

In 2019, I moved to a new neighborhood. And during that time, I became emboldened to begin exploring drawings inspired by some of my favorite periods of art history: the Vienna Succession Movement and Surrealism. I remember taking time off in the summer specifically to work on copies of the Paul Delvaux painting, “Les Mains” (1941). Not to mention, I created one of my favorite drawings, inspired by a short story I read by F. Scott Fitzgerald, “Winter Dreams.” So much of this time represented for me a new beginning, and I was forming a relationship with my work that was new and exciting.

2020

2020 began as a strong year, creatively. I made modifications to my studio space to accommodate the scope of some very interesting projects I was working on. One of my favorites from this time were preliminary sketches I made for a show at Carnegie Hall. While the show itself never panned at, working on these sketches were exciting because I was envisioning an idea with a theatrical scope. In March, along with likely every person in the world, I found major aspects of my life take on a seismic shift. Adjusting to the transition, I took a brief foray into introspective photography methods and writing before finally returning to art. And when I returned, I found myself painting.

For the first time since perhaps my undergraduate days, painting became my primary focus. Separated from others, I became subsumed in making watercolors with multiple washes. I took to using digital mediums (like procreate) to plan out my pieces. One of the favorite pieces I made during this time was a quick walnut ink study I made, inspired by the film Metropolis, which I affectionally titled “Odessa.” However, much more of my work focused on creating watercolors in full color.

Present

In the beginning of this year, I began working in oil. The work I am currently making in oil, much like my experimental photographs, are still conceptually unfinished. However, it signifies an expanding outward, that will increasingly make itself known in the later future. I don’t know what this coming year will bring in terms of new artistic production, but I am excited to be continuing to make work within it.

To view my complete presentation, click here

February 2021 / Studio Update

February 27, 2021

I hope everyone has been doing well. I (personally) have been really excited to see some mildly Spring-like weather begin to descend upon New York City. This last month I have lived something of a monk-like existence, subsisting off hot-mustard-turkey-sandwiches and focusing on my work, my education, and my paintings—with the occasional Vincent Price movie thrown in. The photo above that I am sharing is a moment I caught on my windowsill. The drawing, in charcoal, attempts to capture a strange psychological state I am hoping you all can relate to.

There is an importance to me, to integrate art and artmaking within my personal space. Whether it is surrounding myself with my own work, or the work of artists who have inspired me and kept me (somewhat) sane over the last few decades. Artists who have been inspiring me lately include some of the post-impressionists like Edvard Munch, Félix Vallotton and Henri de Toulouse Lautrec. And while I do not see my work as a conduit for expressing the ethos or stylistic sentimentalities of these artists, I feel a poignant personal connection with the worlds these artists inhabited. If I could, I’d leave my modern trappings to visit the dancehalls of the Belle Époque period and glimpse into a fantastic world that inspired artists to paint in that uniquely expressive way.

A recent sketch inspired by Edvard Munch, 2021

Art has a profound power to take us into another world and engages us to view things in a different light. This month, I have been particularly interested in how to approach my artwork differently. Beginning with changing the tools and mediums I am using, having conversations with existing paintings (i.e. asking what those paintings are trying to say through composition, style and color) and seeing what new elements can be taken in and re-expressed. I started painting in oils, which as a watercolor and lithography artist, makes me feel almost like a kid fumbling with a paint set.

I think, as a fine artist, it is important to continually challenge myself and search for external meanings and narratives that can be reimagined in my own work. Even if, at this very moment, it is ultimately unclear what certain newer pieces I am working on are trying to say. Of course, there is perspective, the intention and what one is trying to express in a visual language. But it is also important to question what impact a work has outside of one’s perspective, experience, and symbology.

Death in the Sickroom, Edvard Munch (1893). — ***Death in the Sickroom**, Edvard Munch (1893).***

As a concluding thought, I am sharing this Edvard Munch painting that particularly resonates with me. I appreciate that intense viridian-like shade overtaking the walls, and also seems to linger within the clothing of the mourning figures. I feel that I can relate to the intimacy of the room, and the strained distance between figures who congregate or stand alone within the enclosed scene.

January 2021 / Studio Update

January 27, 2021

The winter often tends to be the most productive time in my studio. The cold weather lends itself to burrowing, and I have the opportunity to spend many uninterrupted hours on painting.

Lately, I have been experimenting with a light application of watercolor on heavyweight drawing paper. My intention is to develop more of a relationship with movement in my pieces. I no longer have been stretching my paper, opting to work directly with a large brush and seeing where it takes me. When the page starts to buckle a bit, I slip it under a large quartro copy of Toulouse-Lautrec: His Complete Lithographs and Drypoints, and immediately start another piece. Sometimes I take a break from paper altogether and sketch digitally using Procreate. Procreate has been a really useful tool, because I can readily work out ideas without having to navigate materials (or clean up, after).

(2021), Watercolor and Ink [in progress]

I like to change up the stylistic elements of my work (the direction of brush strokes, and colors). Generally, unifying characteristics travel between pieces, but I like to see my work as something that grows and changes with time (like a plant budding many flowers). I’m not sure exactly when my subconscious decided dreamy watercolors, gesturing towards the Fin de siècle, should be the river where I’d find repose. However, I’ve accepted the day I paint my last beribboned hat is too far in the future to matter.

Watercolor is a uniquely unforgiving medium, but I love it for it’s immediacy. I often find myself discarding page after page in forlorn experimentation of a new technique. But these discarded pages can be gems. I walk out of my studio and back, looking at a ‘mistake’, realizing that is not a mistake at all but a breakthrough.

I like to use technique and style to express a narrative. There is an introspection that overtakes the personalities I paint, which I think is further softened and made expressive by the cascading lines moving around the physical spaces of these characters. I love the harmonizing effects of lines. The trick is knowing when to stop, and consider the piece “finished.”

The two pieces shown above are more “finished” sketches that I completed on etching paper. It is significant to mention that there is a lot of texture and depth that gets translated into a piece, depending on the quality of the materials used. Etching paper, I’ve found, is very receptive to mark making and calligraphic effects while using a limited palette (particularly when using ink). However, the colors do tend to get muddy easily if one isn’t careful. I often limit my application to one or two colors. However, I am continually testing new pigments (and even brushes).

Painting is always a learning experience. I am looking forward to providing new updates of where I plan to go next in the coming months as I tackle new materials.

Art Process | Printmaking and Lithography

December 22, 2020

In a technologically advanced world, there is a charming antiquity about prints. They are not quite like drawings, however infinitely more precious than something taken straight out from an inkjet printer. Each print can look like it is was carefully and uniquely made. The effect is delicate and personal.

I was first introduced to the world of printmaking when I took a graphic art class in college. I was impressed by the mechanics involved in a large-scale printmaking operation, from noxious acid baths to centuries-old machinery that could take up a bedroom in my small Queens apartment. There is also a comradery and tenderness within printmaking communities who have to learn to live in harmony with each other through necessity of shared studio equipment and technique.

Printing studios are often organized chaos, with various essential products (like ink) on perpetual backorder. I once overheard an instructor complain that the lithography presses in New York were serviced by a single man, that this man was the only person who could really fix them up properly (irritation in his voice rising)—however this same man simply did not feel like fixing the broken press in the studio this month. I couldn’t tell if it was hyperbole, but I laughed imagining printmaking in New York being brought to a standstill by one dilatory printing press savant in Farmingdale. But that anecdote is reflective of how printmaking and printers are in general: impractical and wonderful.

In 2018, in the years prior to quarantine and other challenges of studio space, I was making lithographs at the Art Students League in Midtown. I chose to work in lithography, as I wanted to make prints with a lighter ‘pencil-like’ effect. In the image above, I have side-by-side comparisons of my crayon sketch on the stone (left) and the final print (right). Depending on what sort of crayon you use, the effect of a lithographic crayon can be similar to pencil or charcoal. The crayons contain a wax that repels etching fluid, turning untreated areas into an ink repellent surface.

Historically, printmaking was a process that was used to replicate art prior to photography. Printmaking has now taken on a second life as an artform living for itself, and I couldn’t be happier. Entering into a printmaking studio, one can feel transported into an older world than one’s own.

Working primarily in paper mediums, printmaking was the instant friend that flew out from the darkness. Hopefully, it is something I will return to in the not-too-distant future.

Lithographs (2018)