E.098 Three figures by a building 1995; reworked 2002 and 2007

• I. 1st state of 10, 1995

  Etching. Three men stand on a footpath, to the left of an Art Deco apartment block. In the building’s narrow front garden, behind a low fence, are a tall, leaning cypress and a shorter tree, with a circular crown. The figures of the men are cast in light, while an oblique shadow falls across the building. There are four variant impressions of this state.

  1. Cleanly wiped impression on wove paper, printed by Rick Amor in his Alphington studio. Inscribed in pencil, below the plate mark: lower left: ‘1 [circled] I’; lower centre: ‘Three Figures by a Building’; lower right: signed and dated ‘Rick Amor ’95’.
  2. Impression with plate tone, on wove paper, printed by Rick Amor in his Alphington studio. Inscribed in pencil, below the plate mark: lower left: ‘1 [circled] II’; lower centre: ‘Three Figures by a Building’; lower right: signed and dated ‘R. Amor ’95’.
  3. Cleanly wiped impression on wove paper, printed by Rick Amor in his Alphington studio. Inscribed in pencil, below the plate mark: lower left: ‘1 [circled] III’; lower centre: ‘Three Figures by a Building’; lower right: signed and dated ‘R. Amor ’95’.
  4. Dark impression with much plate tone, on wove paper, printed by Rick Amor in his Alphington studio. Inscribed in pencil, below the plate mark: lower left: ‘1 [circled] IV’; lower centre: ‘Three Figures by a Building’; lower right: signed and dated ‘R. Amor ’95’.

• I.a. 1st state of 10, 1995

  

  Etching. Three men stand on a footpath, to the left of an Art Deco apartment block. In the building’s narrow front garden, behind a low fence, are a tall, leaning cypress and a shorter tree, with a circular crown. The figures of the men are cast in light, while an oblique shadow falls across the building. There are four variant impressions of this state.

• II. 2nd state of 10, 1995

  The sky has been darkened and all shadows have been strengthened. The balcony on the face of the building, at the upper right, has been removed and the trees have been further etched. There are two variant impressions of this state.

  1. Cleanly wiped impression on wove paper, printed by Rick Amor in his Alphington studio. Inscribed in pencil, below the plate mark: lower left: ‘2 [circled] I’; lower centre: ‘Three Figures by a Building’; lower right: signed and dated ‘Rick Amor ’95’.
  2. Cleanly wiped impression on wove paper, printed by Rick Amor in his Alphington studio. Inscribed in pencil, below the plate mark: lower left: ‘2 [circled] II’; lower centre: ‘Three Figures by a Building’; lower right: signed and dated ‘R. Amor ’95’.

• II.a. 2nd state of 10, 1995

  

  The sky has been darkened and all shadows have been strengthened. The balcony on the face of the building, at the upper right, has been removed and the trees have been further etched. There are two variant impressions of this state.

• III. 3rd state of 10, 1995

  Burnishing has been introduced to modulate the dark areas and restore spatial modelling. In particular, the right side of the cypress and the top of the tree to its right have been lightened and the building’s dark entrance at the lower right has now been given three light, vertical stripes. There are two variant impressions of this state.

  1. Cleanly wiped impression on wove paper, printed by Rick Amor in his Alphington studio. Inscribed in pencil, below the plate mark: lower left: ‘3 [circled] I’; lower centre: ‘Three Figures by a Building’; lower right: signed and dated ‘R. Amor ’95’.
  2. Impression with plate tone, on wove paper, printed by Rick Amor in his Alphington studio. Inscribed in pencil, below the plate mark: lower left: ‘3 [circled] II’; lower centre: ‘Three Figures by a Building’; lower right: signed and dated ‘R. Amor ’95’.

• IV. 4th state of 10, 1995

  The dark tone of the shadows on the building has been selectively lightened, through burnishing. The entire trunk of the smaller tree is now visible and the building’s dark entrance has been made correspondingly narrower. There are three variant impressions of this state.

  1. Cleanly wiped impression on wove paper, printed by Rick Amor in his Alphington studio. Inscribed in pencil, below the plate mark: lower left: ‘4 [circled] I’; lower centre: ‘Three Figures by a Building’; lower right: signed and dated ‘R. Amor ’95’.
  2. Impression with plate tone, on wove paper, printed by Rick Amor in his Alphington studio. Inscribed in pencil, below the plate mark: lower left: ‘4 [circled] II’; lower centre: ‘Three Figures by a Building’; lower right: signed and dated ‘R. Amor ’95’.
  3. Cleanly wiped impression on wove paper, printed by Rick Amor in his Alphington studio. Inscribed in pencil, below the plate mark: lower left: ‘4 [circled] III’; lower centre: ‘Three Figures by a Building’; lower right: signed and dated ‘R. Amor ’95’.

• V. 5th state of 10, 1995

  The end of the fence has been defined with etching and is now depicted at a different angle. There are four variant impressions of this state.

  1. Cleanly wiped impression on smooth-surfaced wove paper, printed by Rick Amor in his Alphington studio. Inscribed in pencil, below the plate mark: lower left: ‘AP I’; lower centre: ‘Three Figures by a Building’; lower right: signed and dated ‘R. Amor ’95’.
  2. Dark impression with plate tone, on smooth-surfaced wove paper, printed by Rick Amor in his Alphington studio. Inscribed in pencil, below the plate mark: lower left: ‘AP II’; lower centre: ‘Three Figures by a Building’; lower right: signed and dated ‘R. Amor ’95’.
  3. Cleanly wiped impression on smooth-surfaced wove paper, printed by Rick Amor in his Alphington studio. Inscribed in pencil, below the plate mark: lower left: ‘AP III’; lower centre: ‘Three Figures by a Building’; lower right: signed and dated ‘R. Amor ’95’. This impression has clear tonal differentiation.
  4. Dark, selectively wiped impression with plate tone, on smooth-surfaced wove paper, printed by Rick Amor in his Alphington studio. Inscribed in pencil, below the plate mark: lower left: ‘AP IV’; lower centre: ‘Three Figures by a Building’; lower right: signed and dated ‘R. Amor ’95’. In this impression, the light falls on the group of three. men at the lower left, and illuminates only the top of the building,

• First edition, 1995

  Nominal and variable edition of ten, but only seven impressions were printed and numbered. These are on wove paper and were printed by Rick Amor in his Alphington studio. The edition included a bon à tirer impression. Each impression is inscribed in pencil, below the plate mark: lower left: ‘[status of impression]’ [or] ‘[1 through 7]/10’; lower centre: ‘Three Figures by a Building’; lower right: signed and dated ‘Rick Amor ’95’.

  Edition sheet size: 380 x 280 mm

• Bon à tirer impression (first edition, 1995; impression of 5th state of 10) (Featured Image)

  

  The end of the fence has been defined with etching and is now depicted at a different angle.

• VI. 6th state of 10, 2002

  

  New work has been added in drypoint. The smaller tree is now taller and its crown of foliage wider, almost touching the window above it. The shadow on the long side of the fence has been burnished, and now terminates in an oblique end. The long oblique shadow at the upper right has been reduced; it now cuts across the upper left corner of the window.

  Impression on textured wove paper, printed by Rick Amor in his Alphington studio. Inscribed in pencil, below the plate mark: lower left: ‘1-1’; lower centre: ‘Three Figures by a Building’; lower right: signed and dated: ‘R Amor ’02’. Although inscribed ‘1-1’, this is the sixth state.

• VII. 7th state of 10, 2002

  The uppermost part of the foliage of the smaller tree has been darkened with drypoint.

  Impression on textured wove paper, printed by Rick Amor in his Alphington studio. Inscribed in pencil, below the plate mark: lower left: ‘1-2’; lower centre: ‘Three Figures by a Building’; lower right: signed and dated ‘R. Amor ’02’. Although inscribed ‘1-2’, this is the seventh state.

• VIII. 8th state of 10, 2002

  The area around the perimeter of the smaller tree has been lightened through burnishing.

  Impression on textured wove paper, printed by Rick Amor in his Alphington studio. Inscribed in pencil, below the plate mark: lower left: ‘1-3’; lower centre: ‘Three Figures by a Building’; lower right: signed and dated ‘R. Amor ’02’. Although inscribed ‘1-3’, this is the eighth state.

• IX. 9th state of 10, 2002

  The shadow on the long side of the fence now ends vertically.

  Impression on textured wove paper, printed by Rick Amor in his Alphington studio. Inscribed in pencil, below the plate mark: lower left: ‘1-4’; lower centre: ‘Three Figures by a Building’; lower right: signed and dated ‘R. Amor ’02’. Although inscribed ‘1-4’, this is the ninth state.

• X. 10th and final state, 2007

  The angle of the short end of the fence has been adjusted. This part of the fence has also been extended, and now reaches just past the third man from the left in the group of figures.

  Impression with plate tone, on wove Velin Arches paper, printed by Martin King at the Australian Print Workshop, Fitzroy (Melbourne). Inscribed in pencil, below the plate mark: lower left: ‘AP’; lower centre: ‘Three Figures by a Building’; lower right: signed and dated ‘R. Amor ’07’. APW chop mark embossed in lower right corner.

• Second edition, 2007

  Edition of ten numbered impressions, on wove Velin Arches 250 gsm paper, printed by Martin King at the Australian Print Workshop, Fitzroy (Melbourne), January 2007. All edition impressions are uniformly printed with plate tone. The edition included a bon à tirer impression, an artist’s proof and two APW workshop proofs. Each impression is inscribed in pencil, below the plate mark: lower left: ‘[status of impression]’ [or] ‘[1 through 10]/10’; lower centre: ‘Three Figures by a Building’; lower right: signed and dated ‘R Amor 07’. APW chop mark embossed in lower left corner.

  Edition sheet size: 284 x 250 mm

• Edition impression (second edition, 2007)

  

  The angle of the short end of the fence has been adjusted. This part of the fence has also been extended, and now reaches just past the third man from the left in the group of figures.

• Comment

  The building depicted here is a block of Art Deco flats in Victoria Parade, East Melbourne, a suburb adjacent to Melbourne’s commercial centre. Amor included this building in three of his prints, the first being the etching The flats, 1991 (cat. no. E.040), which shows the structure from the front. This work was followed, in 1993, by a colour woodcut in which the rear of the building is depicted; the present etching, which is closer to the woodcut than to the 1991 etching, came next. Figures seen from behind appear in all three prints, providing their subjects with a mysterious narrative element.

  Amor took the initial (1995) version of E.098 through five states, establishing a dark tonality in the second state but then using burnishing to restore to the architecture, and other compositional elements, a strong sense of modelling and spatial depth. Numerous impressions were printed for the five states worked in 1995, with the artist continually experimenting with wiping and plate tone. In 2002, with the introduction of drypoint, the image was moved even more decisively in a nocturnal direction. The darkness affected principally the mass of the building and the vegetation, and served also to isolate the group of three men, who remained in light. In the final version of the print, made in 2007, the entire scene was cast in darkness through the use of uniformly printed plate tone, evoking a mood of complicity and suggesting the occurrence of some unspecified but sinister event.

  The block of flats depicted in E.098 appears also in Amor’s painting The witness, 2002.