Loss, 2018

Appearing as faint, abstract landscapes, this aquatint by Linnéa Gad is created using only brushes to mark the surface of the copper plate, before printing. The series takes inspiration from the early 1600s prints of Dutch artist Hercules Seghers, whose landscape etchings possess an abstracted, sponge-like quality that lends his vistas a special kind of indefinite complexity. Following Seghers lead, Gad adopts a similar painterly engagement with printmaking techniques. Approaching each plate as she would a canvas, she adds tonal nuances with layers of nitric acid, resin and varnish (a process known as aquatint) to create shadowy variations in each unique state print. Subjected to these time-sensitive processes, Gad’s landscapes are imbued also with a temporal dimension, their creation mirroring the unexpected and uncontrolled elements of nature.