PLEASE NOTE PRICE INCREASE FOR THE FOLLOWING SIZE PRINTS
SMALL: £200
MEDIUM: £245
EXTRA LARGE £325
Unframed Prints can be ordered by phone or post and delivered throughout the UK,
Sonia Rollo was educated at Glasgow University, graduating with a B.Sc in agricultural botany. She worked in scientific publishing as editor of Chemoreception Abstracts.
Sonia Rollo studied printmaking at Morley College, London. She is a founder member of Half Moon Printmakers, a member of the cooperative Southbank Printmakers and a past vice chair of the Printmaker's Council.
Sonia's interest in animals started in childhood with a pig called Hilary, two geese called Charlie and Cassandra, and a mongrel, Pearl.
Training as a biologist meant observing plants and animals, drawing them to aid understanding. But now she can have fun with her drawings and making them into etchings.
Sonia Rollo has exhibited throughout the UK since 1993 and her work is often selected for the London Royal Academy Summer Exhibition. This is how the Modern Artists Gallery discovered Sonia's wonderful work over 15 years ago.
Technique
Sonia Rollo creates her animal etchings by first drawing the outline of the animal. Using a zinc metal plate covered with a fine dusting of rosin, which has been melted on. Areas, which are to remain white, are painted over with varnish. The plate is immersed in a bath of nitric acid to bite between the blobs of rosin. This makes the aquatint. The plate is then cleaned. Afterwhich the plate is covered with a layer of soft wax, drawing into the wax using a needle, a wire brush or often a pan scrub, to give the texture of fur or feather. The plate goes back into the nitric acid to bite the lines.
Each print is made by covering the plate with ink, then wiping off the surplus ink with muslin. The inked plate is put on a hand-operated press and covered with damp paper. The print arrives cold and wet off the press.