About The Artist:
Karl Fred Dahmen
As a painter and object artist, Dahmen was one of the most important representatives of Informel, and was therefore counted among the most important artists of the German postwar period. Dahmen studied art initially at the art school in Aachen (1931-1933) and then at the Academy of Munich. The artist’s early work includes tachistic oriented pictures as well as wood collages. After an apprenticeship as a commercial artist, he became a...
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About The Medium:
Etching
The printing process of using strong acid or mordant to cut into the unprotected parts of a metal surface to create a design in intaglio (incised) in the metal. In traditional pure etching, a metal (usually copper, zinc or steel) plate is covered with a waxy ground which is resistant to acid. The artist then scratches off the ground with a pointed etching needle where they want a line to appear in the finished piece, exposing the bare metal. The plate is then put through a high-pressure printing press together with a sheet of paper (often moistened to soften it). The paper picks up the ink from the etched lines, making a print.