E.149 Fondamente Nove 2007

• I. 1st state of 3

  Etching with pencil and pen and ink. A view towards the lagoon from the Fondamente Nove, with mooring posts and a barge in the foreground. On the horizon is Mestre, on the mainland.

  Impression squared diagonally in pencil and drawn over with pen and indian ink, on wove paper, printed by Rick Amor in his Alphington studio. Inscribed in pencil, below the plate mark: lower left: ‘1-1’; lower right: signed and dated ‘R Amor 07’.

• I. 1st state of 3, squared diagonally with pencil and touched extensively with pen and indian ink

  

  Etching with pencil and pen and ink. A view towards the lagoon from the Fondamente Nove, with mooring posts and a barge in the foreground. On the horizon is Mestre, on the mainland.

• II. 2nd state of 3

  The pen and ink additions to the first state have been carried, with much new etched modelling added. This gives depth and substance to the details and to the subject as a whole. There are two variant impressions of this state.

  1. Impression with light plate tone, on wove Hahnemühle paper, printed by Rick Amor in his Alphington studio. Inscribed in pencil, below the plate mark: lower left: ‘1-2’; lower right: signed and dated ‘R Amor 07’.
  2. Cleanly wiped impression on wove Hahnemühle paper, printed by Rick Amor in his Alphington studio. Inscribed in pencil, below the plate mark: lower left: ‘2-2’; lower right: signed and dated ‘R Amor 07’.

• II.b. 2nd state of 3

  

  The pen and ink additions to the first state have been carried, with much new etched modelling added. This gives depth and substance to the details and to the subject as a whole. There are two variant impressions of this state.

• III. 3rd and final state

  The plate has been burnished in places, to make it clear that the light falls from the left, and to enhance the plasticity of the mooring posts. The following areas have been lightly burnished (left to right): the coiled loop in the lower left corner, the left side of the third post from the left, and the ropes coiled around the mooring posts just right of centre. There are two variant impressions of this state.

  1. Impression with light plate tone, on wove Hahnemühle paper with watermark, printed by Rick Amor in his Alphington studio. Inscribed in pencil, below the plate mark: lower left: ‘1-3’; lower right: signed and dated ‘R Amor 07’.
  2. Cleanly wiped impression on wove Hahnemühle paper, printed by Rick Amor in his Alphington studio. Inscribed in pencil, below the plate mark: lower left: ‘2-3’; lower right: signed and dated ‘R Amor 07’.

• III.a. 3rd and final state

  

  The plate has been burnished in places, to make it clear that the light falls from the left, and to enhance the plasticity of the mooring posts. The following areas have been lightly burnished (left to right): the coiled loop in the lower left corner, the left side of the third post from the left, and the ropes coiled around the mooring posts just right of centre. There are two variant impressions of this state.

• Edition, 2007

  Edition of ten numbered impressions, on wove Velin Arches paper, printed by Rosalind Atkins at the Australian Print Workshop, Fitzroy (Melbourne), November 2007. The edition was uniformly printed with plate tone and selectively wiped. It included a bon à tirer impression, an artist’s proof, two APW workshop proofs, and a presentation proof. Each impression is inscribed in pencil, below the plate mark: lower left: ‘[status of impression]’ [or] ‘[1 through 10]/10’; lower centre: ‘Fondamente Nove’; lower right: signed and dated ‘R Amor 07’. Chop mark embossed in lower right corner ‘APW [within horizontal rectangle]’.

  Edition sheet size: 280 x 380 mm

• Edition impression, 2007 (Featured Image)

  

• Comment

  This was the last of the Venetian subjects to be completed and, like Amor’s other Fondamente Nove print (cat. no. E.141), it was etched entirely in Melbourne, from a photograph (now lost).

  E.149 depicts a view from the embankment looking over the water towards Mestre. Amor found the barges moored along the Venetian quays an appealing subject, a distant echo of his youth by the waters of Port Phillip Bay.

  The first state impression of this work was squared by the artist in his Alphington studio, in preparation for a work in another medium, but this was never made.