Seems like a few people have been inspired to put pen/pencil to paper recently by RxH sculpts. Hiro's , Lamoursupreme's and Gatchabert's homages have been simply amazing.

Recently I bought one of these...


so I could print some of these....



and a little more close up so you can see the etching



I'm really happy with how these came out. They are faaaaar removed from what I usually do, but I really enjoyed working in a more illustrative way. I'd be interested to hear what people think of them (good or bad (nervous icon))

when you work out with those round dumbells, do you wear a one shoulder singlet, twist your handlebar mustache, and then ride off on a bike with a giant front wheel when you are done?

oh, and i like the textures of these etchings. can you print other things with that press?

LOL!

no, as anyone who has met me can attest, I only use those weights to flatten sheets of damp paper

relief printing (Linocuts, woodblocks) and intaglio (etching, drypoint, collograph) are all fine, but I'm nervous about putting anything too textured through it as the plate could punch a hole through the blankets.

That press looks sweet. Where'd you get it from?

Got it from a place in Tokyo called Bumpodo. Well wqorth checking out if you need obscure artist materials in Japan.

Looking good. I'd like to see something up front, like in the foreground and middle ground where' they're standing just to even it all out. The back kind of distracts my eye a bit with nothing up front, but great design I love em! Fits the characters.

Also, I just got into heavy weightlifting, maybe I listen to too much Danzing? I generally hate exercise but lifting is not bad, I kinda dig it.

ALSO I once had a curly mustache and was refered to as a "Lynard Skynard looking motherfucker."

i would love a set!

I actually LIKE the backgrounds, particularly the Bigalo one.
And there's always a lot of 'space' in Mondo's work -
look at the canvas behind the press.
(I don't know why though - you'll have to ask HIM that).

I like the Chaos' menacing pose.
The Bigalo made me laugh, though not in a bad way.
It looks like Chaos got stuck inside Bigalo's armor
& can't see where he's going now.

I like the background too, just would like it more if there was a matching foreground and middle ground is what I was saying. Kinda distracts my eye.

What's there is great, it just feels unfinished to me, but again I'm not familiar with mondos work.

Yeah, I know what you mean.
I kind of feel the same in a different way ...
like I want to zoom in closer to the subject?

wow, that's cool.....

how does that machine work?

Great etchings! Nice use of negative space...foreground detail would just distract.

it has beena long time since i used one but it's something like this:

you have the etching or negative image or whatever plate you want to make a print of.

you apply ink to the plate and squeegee off the excess. put the plate down on the paper, then you put these printers blankets on the plate/paper (like heavy wool sheets of fabric that protect the rollers on the press from the metal plate and vice versa)

then you use that big crank on the side to roll the platform that all that stuff is on under the rollers and it prints the ink left on the plate onto the paper

Very cool Mondo....what a great machine to have around the Casa.

DAMN!!! I think I'm more impressed that you bought one of those printing machines...lol...that was really geeky. I've been trying to think of an alternative to screen printing...although not really thinking hard enough about it...and that is a great option. Gratz on scoring the machine and cool prints.

i LOVE the bigaro one. great work and doesn't it feel good to create with your hands again? i just did an oil painting for my brother and his wife as a wedding gift and i hadn't painted since college. hat's off...BOOM!

Thanks for all the input!

I'll have to think about what Blooddrinker's saying. I do enjoy using space, and negative space in my work. I was hoping to make compositions that had enough balance with only the background and subject, with the rest being blank areas. It sounds like it worked for some and not others. I do think the Chaos works better in this regard, with the Bigaro the background starts a little abruptly.

Brian these are great. I think the Bigaro one works great! It reminds me of 80's movies for some reason.

how much was that press? i love etching

A whopping 300,000yen I was looking into getting one machined for me, there are plans on the net, but I quickly came to realise that would just be a nightmare to do over here.

thats awsome!

Really nice work. I did a screen printing - print making course recently. It's a great artform. Keep those prints coming.

Now you can officially drop the line:
"Hey babe, wanna come back to my place and check my etchings?"

those look great, i haven't done a relief etching since college. those are acid etched or what?