Rubbings Revealing Cross Images

Rubbings – An impression of an embossed or raised surface made by placing a piece of paper over it and then rubbing over the paper with a pencil, wax crayon or other colouring medium in a solid form.

I chose to use the cross shape in between some of the tiles in my house (9).  These are raised and have a slight uneven edge which I hoped would produce a good and interesting rubbing.

These rubbings were made with a HB Derwent Sketching Pencil,  a Blue Watersoluble colour crayon from Caran d’Ache Neocolor 11, and a red stick of chalk. (11)

The papers used were 140 gsm cartridge paper, brown parcel paper, copy paper, and tissue paper. (10)

Using each of the colouring mediums on each type of paper I proceeded to see which combination would produce a clear copy of the cross shape between the tiles.

Both the pencil and crayon produced good rubbings compared to the chalk stick.  However I do feel the crayon, in most cases, produced the clearest images. It was able, due to the softer nature of the wax, pick out  the intricate edges. The chalk stick images are not always clear and the chalk powder seemed to be too thick to pick up the difference in the edges of the tiles and the indentation of the grouting. The pencil did produce some good images, and if you only had this option to hand it would be a good alternative to the crayon.

The papers that I felt produced the best images were the copy paper and brown parcel paper with all mediums. They were both quite pliable, therefore allowing the mediums to ‘feel’ the indentations underneath them.  Whereas I had the most trouble with the tissue paper, in some cases the rubbing medium caught it and there are slight tears in the paper.  The cartridge paper, although was able to produce an image, was just too thick  to pick up all the indentations.

 

I had used the same pressure and direction of rubbing for all the above tests. I then wanted to see what would happen if I tried different methods of rubbing.  I chose the copy paper and crayon to try these out, the combination from the previous tests that I found had made good impressions.

The first trial was to press very lightly with the crayon and only use it in one direction across the paper, and not going over it more than this once (24). I got an impression but, as probably was expected, it was not a very clear one. Then I pressed very firmly with the crayon, using it from side to side and going over my marks more than once (25).  A very clear impression that almost seems 3D was made. Lastly, I tried going over the paper with a circular motion (26).  I like the impression that it gave and the effect of the circles defines the cross shape with an interesting pattern surrounding it.

Nos. 27-32. These are some trial rubbings I worked on before choosing the tiles.  They have been worked on a 100 gsm paper and the same pencil and crayon (although brown in colour). 

(27) the the manhole cover seen in the photos under Man Made. Produced a good rubbing with both mediums but was rather large to carry out many trials on (and it started to rain when I was working on this section).

(28) fence panel seen in the photos under Man Made.  It was not easy to keep the paper in place to make these rubbings (and it started to rain when I was working on this section).

(29) a yoga roll.  Not a very good choice, although the impression on the roll looked like it would produce a cross pattern.

(30) the side of a glass vase. Produced  a clear cross pattern with the crayon, but it was difficult to manipulate the paper and rubbing medium on the side of the vase due to its shape.

(31) grid on a fan cover.  This had a clear cross grid but when I tried to produce a rubbing, neither medium showed the cross grid.

(32) the emblem on the waste bin seen in the photos under Man Made.  Although this emblem felt embossed when I touched it, the rubbings produced are very faint and one side almost non existent.