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Otranto Market
A weekly Wednesday morning happening. Went to the Saturday weekly market, where I bought some fabulous cherries, clothes pins, tinfoil pans, and a cute little travel purse. The setting was very nice, in a parking lot with lots of trees. It was also the most organized market I’ve been to in Europe, with the food in one section, household items in another, clothing in another, and shoes on the last row!
Then I went to the internet cafe to post on the blog. I usually have the blog ready to upload, pictures cropped to 600x800 pixels (goes so much faster). Then I check all my emails and make a pass at facebook.
Today was my first real workday. I got a lot of prep work done in the morning. After siesta, Federico, resident photographer, scuba diver, and a really nice young man, came up to the castle with his HP printer, and we printed my negatives. Pixa told me about a show in Spain (I think) that is 10cm x 10cm, so I thought that would be fun to try. Instead of 5” negs, I made 10cm negs!!! You can hardly tell the difference.
I am having
Drying paper
Shrink and resize the paper before beginning to work on it lots of interesting results and problems to solve. Water is an issue… the castle water has soooooooo many minerals that it reacts with the iron salts of the cyanotype, staining the paper with brown splotches. So I will bring drinking water to develop the cyanotypes.
The cyanotype mix that I bought is very very weak. So I dumped the second set of powdered chemicals into the first. That should help the blue color. I will stop by the farmacia and get some hydrogen pyroxide to intensify the color.
I put up a clothes line to dry the paper, but the castle rock walls are so damp that the paper won’t dry!!! It was still wet the next day. I do know something about stone walls from the Prairie House!!! A hair dryer is now in order.
I brought the trial cyanotypes home last evening, and coated them with gelatin sizing. I’m ready to start the next trials, getting the gum bichromate mixture correct. At this time it is heavy on pigment, as it traveled to Italy in that fashion.
We had a late dinner. Martha got home after
Pizza
Shared a pizza with Martha 8, having been on a tour of the roof of the castle. I’m looking forward to that tomorrow… the castle is having a huge party on the roof on Friday, we think. There is lots going on, caterers, chairs and tables, barbeque grills.
We went to a fantastic pizza place that Martha found the other day, La Bella Idursa. There are lines of people waiting to get in. We split a pizza of eggplant and tomatoes and cheese. So GOOD!!!! Most people around us were having a whole pizza each… no way. The total bill including ½ litre of wine and large beer draft was 15 euro total.
Went home and put the glass out for the recycler in the morning. Slept well in the cool air.
More photos below.
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