‘One image of a veiled woman was all net and nose. Then, by laying down carefully pared pieces of onion-skin tissue-paper behind the place where the impression would be made, Brian brought out and made visible the expression of traumatized, envious sympathy the artist had engraved into the wood in her depiction of the woman’s face. It slowly came alive at his touch – though Brian would pass the credit back to the artist who created the picture. I suppose he is right; but his contribution is closer to that of a concert pianist interpreting a score than that of an engineer.’
Simon Brett, a wood engraver himself, remembers watching Brian Bailey, a letterpress printer at Libanus Press in Marlborough (where most of the Society of Wood Engravers books are printed) printing Judy Jaidinger’s engravings for E. Nesbit’s The Three Mothers. From Slightly Foxed Issue 4, Winter 2004.
About the contributor
Judith Jaidinger is an American artist and trained in drawing, painting and printmaking at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, and was introduced wood engraving by British-born print-master Adrian Troy. Her work deals much with the predicament of women from the nineteenth century onward, and can be found in numerous museums, institutions and private collections. Of her work, she says ‘Art is a stabilizing and organizing force in my life. It is a refuge from the day to day requirements of making a living and from the turmoil we are exposed to in the world around us.’