Mezzotint
Encyclopedia
Printmaking
Printmaking is the process of making artworks by printing, normally on paper. Printmaking normally covers only the process of creating prints with an element of originality, rather than just being a photographic reproduction of a painting. Except in the case of monotyping, the process is capable...
process of the intaglio
Intaglio (printmaking)
Intaglio is a family of printmaking techniques in which the image is incised into a surface, known as the matrix or plate, and the incised line or area holds the ink. Normally, copper or zinc plates are used as a surface, and the incisions are created by etching, engraving, drypoint, aquatint or...
family, technically a drypoint
Drypoint
Drypoint is a printmaking technique of the intaglio family, in which an image is incised into a plate with a hard-pointed "needle" of sharp metal or diamond point. Traditionally the plate was copper, but now acetate, zinc, or plexiglas are also commonly used...
method. It was the first tonal method
Grayscale
In photography and computing, a grayscale or greyscale digital image is an image in which the value of each pixel is a single sample, that is, it carries only intensity information...
to be used, enabling half-tones to be produced without using line- or dot-based techniques like hatching
Hatching
Hatching is an artistic technique used to create tonal or shading effects by drawing closely spaced parallel lines...
, cross-hatching or stipple. Mezzotint achieves tonality by roughening the plate with thousands of little dots made by a metal tool with small teeth, called a "rocker." In printing, the tiny pits in the plate hold the ink when the face of the plate is wiped clean. A high level of quality and richness in the print can be achieved.
Dark to light method
This became the most common method. The whole surface (usually) of a metalMetal
A metal , is an element, compound, or alloy that is a good conductor of both electricity and heat. Metals are usually malleable and shiny, that is they reflect most of incident light...
, usually copper, plate is roughened evenly, manually with a rocker, or mechanically. If the plate were printed at this point it would show as solid black. The image is then created by selectively burnishing areas of the surface of the metal plate with metal tools: the smoothed parts will print lighter than those areas not smoothed by the burnishing tool. A burnisher has a smooth, round end, which flattens the minutely protruding points comprising the roughened surface of the metal printing plate. Areas smoothed completely flat will not hold ink at all: such areas will print "white," that is, without ink. By varying the degree of smoothing, mid-tones between black and white can be created, hence the name mezzo-tinto which is Italian
Italian language
Italian is a Romance language spoken mainly in Europe: Italy, Switzerland, San Marino, Vatican City, by minorities in Malta, Monaco, Croatia, Slovenia, France, Libya, Eritrea, and Somalia, and by immigrant communities in the Americas and Australia...
for "half-tone" or "half-painted". This is called working from "dark to light", or the "subtractive" method.
Light to dark method
Ludwig von Siegen
Ludwig von Siegen was a German soldier and amateur engraver, who invented the printmaking technique of mezzotint, a variant of engraving...
were made in this way. Especially in this method, Mezzotint can be combined with other intaglio techniques such as engraving, on areas of the plate not roughened, or indeed with the dark to light method.
Printing
Printing the finished plate is the same for either method, and follows the normal way for an intaglio plate; the whole surface is inked, the ink is then wiped off the surface to leave ink only in the pits of the still rough areas below the original surface of the plate. The plate is put through a high-pressure printing press next to a sheet of paper, and the process repeated.Because the pits in the plate are not deep, only a small number of top-quality impressions (copies) can be printed before the quality of the tone starts to degrade as the pressure of the press begins to smooth them out. Perhaps only one or two hundred really good impressions can be taken.
Detailed technique
Plates can be mechanically roughened; one way is to rub fine metal filings over the surface with a piece of glass; the finer the filings, the smaller the grain of the surface. Special roughening tools called 'rockers' have been in use since at least the eighteenth century. The method commonly in use today is to use a steel rocker approximately five inches wide, which has between 45 and 120 teeth per inch on the face of a blade in the shape of a shallow arc, with a wooden handle projecting upwards in a T-shape. Rocked steadily from side to side at the correct angle, the rocker will proceed forward creating burrs in the surface of the copperCopper
Copper is a chemical element with the symbol Cu and atomic number 29. It is a ductile metal with very high thermal and electrical conductivity. Pure copper is soft and malleable; an exposed surface has a reddish-orange tarnish...
. The plate is then moved – either rotated by a set number of degrees or through 90 degrees according to preference – and then rocked in another pass. This is repeated until the plate is roughened evenly and will print a completely solid tone of black.
Tone
Mezzotint is known for the luxurious quality of its tones: first, because an evenly, finely roughened surface holds a lot of ink, allowing deep solid colors to be printed; secondly because the process of smoothing the plate with burinBurin
Burin from the French burin meaning "cold chisel" has two specialised meanings for types of tools in English, one meaning a steel cutting tool which is the essential tool of engraving, and the other, in archaeology, meaning a special type of lithic flake with a chisel-like edge which was probably...
, burnisher and scraper allows fine gradations in tone to be developed. The scraper is a triangular ended tool, and the burnisher has a smooth round end – not unlike many spoon handles.
History
The mezzotint printmaking method was invented by the German amateur artist Ludwig von SiegenLudwig von Siegen
Ludwig von Siegen was a German soldier and amateur engraver, who invented the printmaking technique of mezzotint, a variant of engraving...
(1609–c 1680). His earliest mezzotint print dates to 1642 and is a portrait of Amelia Elizabeth, Landgravine of Hesse-Kassel
Hesse-Kassel
The Landgraviate of Hesse-Kassel or Hesse-Cassel was a state in the Holy Roman Empire under Imperial immediacy that came into existence when the Landgraviate of Hesse was divided in 1567 upon the death of Philip I, Landgrave of Hesse. His eldest son William IV inherited the northern half and the...
(or Hesse-Cassel) (right). This was made by working from light to dark. The rocker seems to have been invented by Prince Rupert of the Rhine
Prince Rupert of the Rhine
Rupert, Count Palatine of the Rhine, Duke of Bavaria, 1st Duke of Cumberland, 1st Earl of Holderness , commonly called Prince Rupert of the Rhine, KG, FRS was a noted soldier, admiral, scientist, sportsman, colonial governor and amateur artist during the 17th century...
, a famous cavalry commander in the English Civil War
English Civil War
The English Civil War was a series of armed conflicts and political machinations between Parliamentarians and Royalists...
, who was the next to use the process, and took it to England. Sir Peter Lely
Peter Lely
Sir Peter Lely was a painter of Dutch origin, whose career was nearly all spent in England, where he became the dominant portrait painter to the court.-Life:...
saw the potential for using it to publicise his portraits, and encouraged a number of Dutch printmakers to come to England.
The process was especially widely used in England from the mid-eighteenth century, to reproduce portraits and other paintings. Since the mid-nineteenth century it has been relatively little used. Robert Kipniss and Peter Ilsted
Peter Ilsted
Peter Ilsted was a leading Danish artist and printmaker. Ilsted, Carl Holsoe and Ilsted’s brother-in-law, Vilhelm Hammershøi, were the leading artists in early 20th century Denmark. All three artists were members of ‘The Free Exhibition’, a progressive art society created around 1890. They are...
are two notable 20th-century exponents of the technique; M. C. Escher
M. C. Escher
Maurits Cornelis Escher , usually referred to as M. C. Escher , was a Dutch graphic artist. He is known for his often mathematically inspired woodcuts, lithographs, and mezzotints...
also used mezzotint from time to time.
Mezzotint engravers
- Ludwig von SiegenLudwig von SiegenLudwig von Siegen was a German soldier and amateur engraver, who invented the printmaking technique of mezzotint, a variant of engraving...
– inventor - Prince Rupert of the RhinePrince Rupert of the RhineRupert, Count Palatine of the Rhine, Duke of Bavaria, 1st Duke of Cumberland, 1st Earl of Holderness , commonly called Prince Rupert of the Rhine, KG, FRS was a noted soldier, admiral, scientist, sportsman, colonial governor and amateur artist during the 17th century...
- Richard JoseyRichard JoseyRichard Josey was a prominent mezzotint engraver in Victorian London.Josey was born at Reading in 1840, and received his education at the Reading Blue Coat School. At the age of 13 he was apprenticed to Thomas W. Knight, and on the expiration of his apprenticeship he worked in the studio of the...
(1840–1906), engraver of James McNeill Whistler'sJames McNeill WhistlerJames Abbott McNeill Whistler was an American-born, British-based artist. Averse to sentimentality and moral allusion in painting, he was a leading proponent of the credo "art for art's sake". His famous signature for his paintings was in the shape of a stylized butterfly possessing a long stinger...
Whistler's MotherWhistler's MotherArrangement in Grey and Black: The Artist's Mother, famous under its colloquial name Whistler's Mother, is an 1871 oil-on-canvas painting by American-born painter James McNeill Whistler. The painting is , displayed in a frame of Whistler's own design, and is now owned by the Musée d'Orsay in Paris....
. - M. C. EscherM. C. EscherMaurits Cornelis Escher , usually referred to as M. C. Escher , was a Dutch graphic artist. He is known for his often mathematically inspired woodcuts, lithographs, and mezzotints...
- Peter IlstedPeter IlstedPeter Ilsted was a leading Danish artist and printmaker. Ilsted, Carl Holsoe and Ilsted’s brother-in-law, Vilhelm Hammershøi, were the leading artists in early 20th century Denmark. All three artists were members of ‘The Free Exhibition’, a progressive art society created around 1890. They are...
- Alexander Hay RitchieAlexander Hay RitchieAlexander Hay Ritchie was an artist and engraver. He was born in Glasgow, Scotland, and studied in the UK under Sir William Allan, before moving to New York in 1841. He specialised in mezzotints.-External links:*...
- T.F. Simon
- Toru IwayaToru Iwayais a Japanese mezzotint engraver and painter.-Biography:Born in Koriyama, Japan in 1936 as the last child of Iwaya Kanekichi and Kageyama Matsu, Toru Iwaya went, at the age of 19, to Tokyo...
- John SartainJohn SartainJohn Sartain was an artist who pioneered mezzotint engraving in the United States.-Biography:John Sartain was born in London, England on October 24, 1808. He learned line engraving, and produced several of the plates in William Young Ottley's Early Florentine School . In 1828, he began to do...
- G. H. Rothe (1935–2007)
- Luke Vehorn
- Francisco Souto
See also
- Prince Rupert of the RhinePrince Rupert of the RhineRupert, Count Palatine of the Rhine, Duke of Bavaria, 1st Duke of Cumberland, 1st Earl of Holderness , commonly called Prince Rupert of the Rhine, KG, FRS was a noted soldier, admiral, scientist, sportsman, colonial governor and amateur artist during the 17th century...
, who helped develop the process
External links
- The early history of mezzotint and the prints of Richard Tompson and Alexander Browne, from the National Portrait Gallery, London – Good feature on the early history
- The Printed image in the West:Mezzotint – from the Metropolitan Museum of Art timeline of Art History – fuller description & history, with images