Introduction
I am reconstructing an image of a walking leaf that is included in James Duncan’s The Naturalist’s Library, Introduction to Entomology (1840). The volume is an educational source for entomology, giving a brief introduction to the field and following with a general overview of the anatomy and the orders and families of insects. Duncan uses the plate as an aide to discuss the features of the walking leaf.
The plate itself is one of 38 plates included in the volume. The dimensions of this plate were not specified, but it is a colored engraving of a drawing provided by Henry Hopely White of a walking leaf insect with its eggs. The printing was made by W. H. Lizars. This plate was a print from an engraving or a copper plate of the drawing, which usually involves engraving the image onto a copper plate and then using that to make a black-and-white print on paper that will be colored in. This is a stable way of preserving the image since it copper plates can last for a very long time and one could just make another printing when necessary.
Because I do not have access to the original drawing, nor the materials (like copper plates or engraving tools) and the skills necessary to make a printing, I will trace the image onto tissue paper and then color with color pencils as a representation of the printing process. I expect that the outcome will resemble the image, but I expect it to deviate because once a plate or engraving has been made, the printing process results in consistent products whereas I would be much more involved in the tracing process. I also want to try etching the image onto a compostable, servery plate as another way to emulate engraving (spur of the moment decision Saturday afternoon). For another reconstruction, I want to try drawing and coloring the image without glasses or contacts to see the effect sight has on reconstruction of the image.
Field Note 1
Date: 2/14/20
People involved: myself
Location: Duncan Commons
Reconstruction conditions:
This was done late at night in Duncan Commons, when there was no one in the commons except myself. The commons were well lit and was pretty quiet, but I decided to play a playlist of piano covers of the Your Name soundtrack to keep me focused.
Time and duration of reconstruction:
35 min.
Equipment and tools used:
Pencils, color pencils, paper, an empty lychee jelly container to use as a makeshift phone stand
Subjective Factors:
The music kept me more focused on what I was doing. My eyes were feeling strained while before I started and as I was making the reconstruction.
Prior Knowledge:
I know that I won’t be able to see as well without glasses, so I assume I will miss some of the finer details of the image. I did take a look at the image so that I would have an idea of what it should look like in the end. I also know that I won’t be able to replicate the colors very well since I have not drawn since my doodles during math class in 7th grade and because the colors and textures resulting from using color pencils differ from printer ink.
Reflection on your practice:
I couldn’t see very well, so I did a lot more erasing than I expected. I realized that not only was I missing some of the finer details, the colors also were also harder to tell apart. The blurriness of my vision actually caused the colors to appear more separated, so it was difficult to tell that there was a gradient between some of the colors. This was especially true on the wings of the insect, where the colors looked more distinctly green, then a white patch, and then a more orange-yellow one. The colors also appeared more orange without glasses, so it was like someone had put a sepia filter on it. I ended up trying to fill up some of the spots I knew had weren’t white like I thought I was seeing, so I added in more color that I thought was there. The eggs were very indistinct, I could barely make out the shapes. The colors just appeared sort of orange with brown lines on them. I would’ve also taken more time on reconstructing it, but I couldn’t really do anything more without taking a better look at the image.
Photos/Video documenting process:
Questions that arise:
Making this reconstruction made me realize the things that I wouldn’t register with my eyes without glasses or looking at the image while it’s an inch from my face. This made me think back to our readings over epistemology and aesthetics as well as the readings over disabilities. Two people can look at the same image and perceive it differently because of their varying degrees of vision. Some are considered far-sighted or near-sighted, some are color-blind, and some can see better in one eye than the other, but is are these people’s perceptions wrong if they don’t see in the same way as someone with “perfect” vision (if there is such a thing as perfect vision to begin with)? And even if two people with “perfect” vision look at the same image, they can still perceive the object differently (take the Rorschach ink-blot test or the white-and-gold or black-and-blue dress for example), so how do we know which is correct if either of them are? I think to answer these questions, we could go back to the argument of redefining our senses with a process-based view that’s alluded to in Dr. Barwich’s article on smell. However, a process-based view is more personal as each person experiences differently. Since modern science attempts to achieve mechanical objectivity by minimizing the amount of human influence in its models and figures, is it possible to achieve mechanical objectivity in visual representations if we switch to a process-based definition of sight?
Field Note 2
Date: 2/15/20
People involved: Lily, Annie, and myself
Location: McMurtry Commons
Reconstruction conditions:
It was early afternoon in McMurtry commons, so it had a lot of ambient lighting. Annie, Lily, and I were each working on the project. There were some other people in the commons all working on their homework, so it wasn’t quiet, but it wasn’t very noisy either.
Time and duration of reconstruction:
35 min.
Equipment and tools used:
Tissue paper, mechanical pencil, wooden No. 2 pencil, color pencils, tape, trusty lychee jelly container phone stand
Subjective Factors:
There was a lot of chatter in the background but nothing too distracting. There was a lot of light from outside through the windows as well as from string lights and the lights in the ceiling. My arms started getting tired as I kept tracing.
Prior Knowledge:
I knew it would be difficult for me to blend the colors to the right shade from the other reconstruction.
Reflection on your practice:
I attempted to do the tracing the night before with a make-shift light box using a flashlight and the empty lychee jelly container, but it hurt my eyes so I chose to do it the next day by taping the image and tissue paper to the window. During my tracing, I found that there were a lot of hatching and cross-hatching lines that I didn’t notice before. I assume this is because straight lines would probably be easier to etch and a made it easier to create a shading effect. Eventually I got to a point where I couldn’t really tell what I had and what I hadn’t colored, so I had to stop.
Photos/Video documenting process:
Questions that arise:
I was wearing contacts while performing this reconstruction. To see the image better, I tried to use a light box before switching to using a window. This reminded me of “The Menagerie of the Senses” article we read and how humans created tools to help extend or improve their senses. In terms of vision for example, we use lenses to increase our visual acuity so that we can see objects at a greater distance more clearly or observe objects too small for the naked eye. In an object-based definition of vision, these tools seem to enforce the idea that objects have their own appearance even if we can’t perceive them (like how Ramón y Cajal’s silver chromate stains show that a neuron has a certain shape even though we can’t see them with unaided human eyes). But in a process-based definition of sight, how do these tools affect how we perceive an object? In a broader scope, how do prosthetics and tools affect the way we perceive the world around us when having a process-based definition of the senses? To answer these questions, I would probably have to revisit Dr. Barwich’s article.
Field Note 3
Date: 2/15/20
People involved: myself
Location: McMurtry Commons
Reconstruction conditions:
I did this reconstruction in the evening. There weren’t a lot of people in the commons, so it wasn’t very loud. It was a little more dim in the commons since it was later in the day.
Time and duration of reconstruction:
22 min
Equipment and tools used:
Compostable servery plate, a screw-driver pen, and the classic lychee jelly container phone stand
Subjective Factors:
It was quiet and dim in the commons. I could smell the sawdust as I was carving into the plate.
Prior Knowledge:
I’ve never tried carving into a servery plate before, and definitely have never tried carving it with a flat-head screwdriver, but I guess it would be similar to carving into wood with a chisel.
Reflection on your practice:
I carved on the reverse side of the plate, which was darker in color so I hoped to see more of a contrast between the carved lines and the plate. It turned out a lot better than I expected, and the lines came out really well once I went over them a few times with the screwdriver. Curved lines were harder to make than straight ones. It was very difficult to do fine marks (like the hatching they used to shade), so I opted out of making most of them. It also was really tiring on my hand, so my work got sloppier as I kept going, so I decided to stop once I thought I couldn’t do any more. In the end, it looked like a line art version of my image.
Photos/Video documenting process:
Questions that arise:
As I was making the engraving into the plate, I was thinking how someone with more practice with and knowledge of engraving could make a more true-to-life reconstruction of the image than I was doing. But then it seems that to achieve a more undoctored image without the use of modern tools, especially the ones you can program to cut or etch exactly where and how you want, a more skillful hand and thus greater human intervention is required. This reminds me of Sir Charles Bell’s claim that just copying would not result in any accurate or useful representation, and that human influence will always be present in the creation of representations. Thus, there seems to create a paradoxical relationship where sometimes in order to achieve greater mechanical objectivity, more human interaction is required. If that’s the case, how should we reconcile the need for a skilled hand in the pursuit of mechanical objectivity in certain media?
Bibliography
Duncan, James. (1840). “The Naturalist’s Library/Introduction to Entomolgy.” Edited by William Jardine, The Naturalist’s Library/Introduction to Entomolgy – Wikisource, the Free Online Library, Edinburgh, W. H. Lizars, https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Naturalist’s_Library/Introduction_to_Entomolgy.
Melville, J. (2016, May 26). Lizars, William Home (1788–1859), painter and engraver. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Retrieved 14 Feb. 2020, from https://www.oxforddnb.com/view/10.1093/ref:odnb/9780198614128.001.0001/odnb-9780198614128-e-16815.