fun with toxins!

to engage other parts of my brain, i figured it was time to actually get around to doing another attempt at etching things. this time, house numbers on copper flashing.

the old house numbers were ugly, so i didn't remount them after the porch work. yes, this means that they've been taped on the wall for a year.

new house numbers are in the same font that i used for a paper spray paint stencil on my trash barrels. i tried laserprinter toner transfer resist, with mediocre success -- i think i need to run it hotter harder longer. (insert double-entendre here.) additional resist was done with the green foil (also mediocre results with an iron) toner encapsulator and touch-up with magic markers. packing tape covered the large swaths of clear space. the etch came out pretty well. i just put patina on the low parts and later i'll polish the high parts to get rid of overflow patina.

pictures here

vandalism or public service?

i am occasionally conflicted about graffiti (or street art or whatever you want to call it). some of it is art. some of it is annoying. some of it is beautifying of ugly buildings and areas, and some of it is just plain vandalism.

i am not at all conflicted about some of the ways that advertising creeps into my life. i generally disapprove of it.

anyways, i read the blog of a street artist who goes by the name posterchild, and he had a post about an event he took part in

it seems there's a company down in NYC that apparently has a crapload of unpermitted (and thus illegal) billboards. a bunch of volunteers got together and did something about it. in the morning, teams went around and whitewashed some huge number of the street-level illegal billboards. later, a bunch of graffiti artists went around and put various pieces of art on the whitewashed billboards.

the wooster collective describes events with pics.
( a couple of pics, with links, behind the cut )

this? this i approve of.