Analog vs. Digital

The topic of this report is rust. Today I realized that I can spend my afternoons watching rust and if it happens quick enough I will be entertained. Rust can be used in the same way that silver can be used in photography, only the process that I have been experimenting with reverses that effect. I have been making reliefs with a combination of screen printing processes and casting, then when I make a cast from the mold I have been using metals like steel, brass, copper and aluminum as a pigment in the pieces that I make. I have chosen photographic images of celebrity mugshots, like Johnny Cash and have made the skin tones and white areas the raised part of the design. Once the image is cast I can sand down and coat the surface with acidic liquids and accelerate a rust effect which lightens the steel. Basically this is a steel version of the photographic process which we typically associate with a silver chemical procedure.