We have a full class of students. Please call or email to be placed on a wait-list.
480.361.1118 – info@artintersection.com
In this intensive two-day workshop, we will learn how to print in the 19th century photographic process of gum bichromate. Using color separation negatives, we’ll learn how to make multilayered, tri-color gum bichromate prints on watercolor paper.
After mixing an emulsion of watercolor pigment, potassium dichromate, and gum arabic, this mixture is brushed on watercolor paper, dried, and by placing a negative on top it is exposed to UV light.
We then ‘develop’ the prints in plain tap water. Layers are built by repeated coatings and careful registration of negatives until a full, rich image is achieved.
We will also explore one-coat, gum over cyanotype, made using black and white negatives.
No prior experience with this type of printing is necessary, so join us for two days of fun and experimentation with this interpretive, intuitive, and infinitely creative photographic printing process. Once you experience the joy of gum printing, you will never be the same!
The making of digital negatives will be shown, but for the workshop itself, please send four color image files (300 dpi at 10” on the long side), and one black and white image file if you would like, at least one week prior to the workshop.
Please complete the WORKSHOP SIGN UP FORM attached below before payment!
Please complete this workshop sign up form before payment! This helps us stay in contact with you as well as update you with any information you may need before the workshop.
Our first Tri-Color Gum Bichromate workshop with Diana Bloomfield last September was such a hit, we decided to do it all again! This past Saturday and Sunday Diana led nine students through this labor-intensive and difficult process. The workshop included many first-time gum printers, and despite the tricky nature of the process, all produced fantastic prints! As we gathered around to look at everyone’s completed work at the end of the two days, one thing was apparent: there is nothing like the magic of gum printing, and no one better to teach it than Diana Bloomfield!
We are grateful for all of our students, but we especially would like to extend a big THANK YOU to our four class participants who travelled from far, far away to take this workshop with us – Cary from Alaska, Timothy from Michigan, and Scott and Kelly from Pennsylvania. We’re so glad you could join us!
Diana discusses digital negatives during her demonstration at the beginning of the workshop
Diana “develops” an exposed print in water
Diana discusses the cyan-layer exposure she demonstrated as it hangs to dry – Terry, the student who provided the negative for this print, will later add yellow and magenta layers
Janet washes out her print after exposing the yellow layer
Karen coats her paper with a mixture of watercolor pigment suspended in potassium dichromate and gum arabic. The potassium dichromate hardens the gum arabic upon exposure to UV light; the parts of the coating blocked by the negative remain soft and wash away in water.
Tim washes out his print
Kelly very carefully registers the negative for her next layer
Janet, Tom, and Matthew attend to their prints
Each layer of pigment make a big impact when gum printing. The print on the left includes cyan, yellow, and magenta layers; the print on the right includes cyan and yellow. Both prints by Karen Hymer
Diana discusses the finished prints one by one with the class
Karen, Diana, and Tom mask off the brush-marked border of Cary King’s image in order to look at the print without visual distractions
Scott Wrage shares his tri-color print, not yet dry enough to pin up, with the rest of the class
Prints clockwise from left by Matthew Covarrubius, Kelly Wrage, Karen Hymer, and Timothy Wells
