"Mouse's Best Friend" - 2024
My artwork output has been severely reduced over these last couple years due to work and life, but each year I manage to work on a couple pieces Sometimes they work out and I've had to scrap one or two pieces each of the last 2 years so...sometimes they don't work out.
Here is this years piece. It is actually a companion piece to my "Pluto's Toy" from 2020. At Disney Hollywood Studios in Florida there is a store located on the left hand side of the park right after you enter called Pluto's Toy Palace. My previous work included the Pluto's Toy part of that sign and this one is a large Pluto neon sign that sits on top of the building.
This piece is also a restart of a previous piece that....didn't work out. Previously, I got excited after printing the second color and immediately started carving. The problem I encountered was that I had carved out not only Pluto's yellow fur, but also his tongue and collar. I really wanted to do this piece though so I had to restart from scratch.
Here are the first four stages to the linocut. I always start our working lightest to darkest and you also have to take into account the transparency of inks as you go darker. In some cases a layer of a very light grey or white may need to printed in order to get a color that you want rather than the color you get when already printed color come through that semi to transparent layer you just printed.
In this instance I printed a light grey later to get a better "tongue pink", "tongue red neon" and "light blue collar".
A couple more layers and at this point the image is actually starting to take shape. This picture at the top of this post is the final piece and in reality a very dark grey for a shadow across the ears and the sky blue were the last two printed colors.
I was very happy with the outcome of this particular piece of artwork. If it would be possible...would I change some things?? Absolutely, but that knowledge will need to be applied to future pieces.
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