Graham Short. Let me show my etchings - part 3 (last one)

... I always try to swim again at lunchtime. My mother used to cook a full roast for me every single day until she died a few months ago aged 101. I often didn't want it, which annoyed her. I tend to eat chocolate biscuits all morning which is terrible. I know. It's my only weakness.

On average a design will take me a day and a half and I'll work Saturdays and Sundays if I've got the work. If I have not, I'll have the weekend off, but I'm not happy. I can't take time off and I never could. I worked so hard when my children were younger. I never saw them grow up. Everything is black and white with me, there is no grey tone. I look at people swanning round, having coffee and I think: Why aren't they working?

I have to stop at 5pm to get the finished dies and the copperplates to the post office before it closes. Then it's a 18 mile drive to Halesowen to coach at a junior swimming club. I might have something to eat before I go, or more biscuits in the car. My second wife, Luba, is very tolerant, but I think her patient is wearing thin.

I have a glass of wine in front of News at 10 and wake up a couple of hours later. If I've something special on, I'll work late into the night. I've always felt that work for the royal family deserves it own ambiance and I might head back to my workshop at 10pm with a bottle of champagne, a loaf of crusty bread and a chunk of roquefort. I love the work, because I'm doing something special with my own hands. I'm usually filthy dirty and I have ruined all my clothes with the acid, but knowing the Queen of England signs her name on paper bearing my engraving means everything to me.

Interview by Caroline Scott - Sunday Times

Graham Short - Let me show you my etchings part3

...

Don't ask me why I choose to engrave the Lord's Prayer on the head of a pin. It really did take over my life and I'm not even religious. I just knew that engraving 278 letters on a two-milimeters surface was something no one else could do and I after that sense of achivement. I experimented with lots of miniature engraving tools and the best were very fine needles made at the turn of the 19th century. I bought 300, 20 years ago, and still have30 left. I flattened the points then re-sharpened them with an Arkansas whetstone. Then they had to be retempered to the right strengh. Small birthday candles work best - once the needle's glowing it's quenched in an egg cup of oil but too much heat and the steel's too soft to work with. I've spent whole days heating and re-heating a needle. I worked on the pin under a microscope, at night, my arm strapped to my side with a leather luggage strap, so my my fingertrips could move. Once I looked up to see a mouse staring straight at me. The pattering of its feet on the floor can cause enough vibration to make the needle slip across the pinhead. I'm incredibly fit, but even my own pulse affected the steadiness of my hand. In the end, I wore a stethoscopy and holding my breath aimed for one stroke at the time, between heart beats.

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http://s2.webstarts.com/engravingkent

Graham Short. Let me show my etchings - part 2

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I used to work in Birmingham's jewellery quarter, but I can work anywhere. I've taken over a room in my mother's house now. I just need my microscope, a lamp and a box of small tools. I start by coating by coating my steel die or copperplate with an acid-resist solution called Janes' Etching Ground, then I begin scratching out the design with a sharp needle. I pour acid into the strokes to soften the surface, moving away any sediment with a pigeon's feather, then use my tools to give them depth. The deeper the cut, the higher the final emboss. You can't beat the feeling of running your finger over ink on smooth paper.

...

Graham Short. Let me show my etchings - part 1

By 5.30am I'm always awake. I shower quickly and eat my porridge looking out of the window.I drive to the local pool eight miles away where I swim 3000metres fast, every morning.There's me, a couple of triathletes and my friend Mike. I used to swim three times a day, 75 000 metres a week, and I was breaking records. I reckon I was the fittest man in the world for my age. I'm a bit of an obsessive and I daresay it cost me my first marriage. It's all or nothing with me.

Most of my work comes from London. The House of Commons prints 21m sheets of headed paper and fortun ately for me the steel dies of the portcullis insignia wear out. I do another every two months. I made a lot of money in the 1980's. I made hand engraved letterheads for all the big banks. I had a big house and sent my children to private schools. That was important for a boy who left school at 14 with one 0-level and a girl's bike. I felt I'd arrived.

I still do business cards and letterheads for no end of celebrities. I've just done Andrew Lloyd Webber's and Richard Branson's. I do Prince Charles stationery and all the royal palaces. The Queen's printer sends me the artwork, but the royal household does' know it's me who makes the engravings. No one does. Id have loved a By Royal Appointment warrant - I've been doing it for 40 years - but it's an anonymous life, is this.

[in times magazine]

Graham Short, 63, copperplate hand engraver

Manual engraving?

http://s2.webstarts.com/engravingkent/

uncovervalues

Today's music...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QvCiBr2UVKE

engraving...

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

St. Jerome in His Study (Dürer)(1514), an engraving by Northern Renaissance master Albrecht Dürer

Master engraver ennobling a watch movement. Top level engravers work under a stereo microscope.

Engraving is the practice of incising a design on to a hard, usually flat surface, by cutting grooves into it. The result may be a decorated object in itself, as whensilver, gold, steel, or glass are engraved, or may provide an intaglio printing plate, of copper or another metal, for printing images on paper as prints or illustrations; these images are also called engravings.

Engraving was a historically important method of producing images on paper, both in artistic printmaking, and also for commercial reproductions and illustrations for books and magazines. It has long been replaced by photography in its commercial applications and, partly because of the difficulty of learning the technique, is much less common in printmaking, where it has been largely replaced by etching and other techniques.

Traditional engraving, by burin or with the use of machines, continues to be practiced by goldsmiths, glass engravers, gunsmiths and others, while modern industrial techniques such as photoengraving and laser engraving have many important applications. Engraved gems were an important art in the ancient world, revived at the Renaissance, although the term traditionally covers relief as well as intaglio carvings, and is essentially a branch of sculpture rather than engraving, as drills were the usual tools.

Think Win-Win isn't about being nice, nor is it a quick-fix technique. It is a character-based code for human interaction and collaboration. Most of us learn to base our self-worth on comparisons and competition. We think about succeeding in terms of someone else failing--that is, if I win, you lose; or if you win, I lose. Life becomes a zero-sum game. There is only so much pie to go around, and if you get a big piece, there is less for me; it's not fair, and I'm going to make sure you don't get anymore. We all play the game, but how much fun is it really? Win-win sees life as a cooperative arena, not a competitive one. Win-win is a frame of mind and heart that constantly seeks mutual benefit in all human interactions. Win-win means agreements or solutions are mutually beneficial and satisfying. We both get to eat the pie, and it tastes pretty darn good! A person or organization that approaches conflicts with a win-win attitude possesses three vital character traits: Integrity: sticking with your true feelings, values, and commitments Maturity: expressing your ideas and feelings with courage and consideration for the ideas and feelings of others Abundance Mentality: believing there is plenty for everyone Many people think in terms of either/or: either you're nice or you're tough. Win-win requires that you be both. It is a balancing act between courage and consideration. To go for win-win, you not only have to be empathic, but you also have to be confident. You not only have to be considerate and sensitive, you also have to be brave. To do that--to achieve that balance between courage and consideration--is the essence of real maturity and is fundamental to win-win.