Stone Lithography with Rudolf Broulim

at the press in his Zwiindrecht, Belgium studio

Earlier this month, to celebrate the new year and share some images with friends, we brought out the old slide projector and pulled some slides from the archive. It was an evening filled with nostalgia, a hot lamp shining light through old transparencies, complete with dust and scratches, the sound of the fan, the aroma of hot dust, and to complete the experience, there was the obligatory stuck slide; we were lucky the bulb didn’t burn out as there were none to be had locally. All in all, it was a fun evening seeing these images again and sharing them with friends. It was also a reminder that the time had come to start that long put off scanning project. Now that scanning is underway I’ll be posting a variety of images, many shot with my favorite camera at the time, a Leica IIf, primarily using Kodachrome 25. These first images are in the atelier of master printer Rudolf Broulim, near Antwerp, where he settled after leaving his native Prague. I wrote a few words about working with him in a previous post. But more, much more should be written about him, as he is not only a master printer, he is one of those rare individuals, a generous spirit who shares his knowledge and experience and takes great joy in the creative process. On the press is the stone I drew for Antwerp Morning, a lithograph in three colors.