Atlantic City Ghosts Printmaking By Jerry Di Falco

Year:

Medium:

Etching Print

Size - (USA):

11 W x 15 H x 0.5 D (inches)

Size - (metric):

27.9 W x 38.1 H x 1.3 D (centimeters)

Theme:

Garden

Edition:

Original

Artwork ID:

633467

PDF Copy:

Artwork Info Sheet (PDF)

Artwork Description:

Print Number 2 of 5 in the final edition, IV. Executed in a special created blend of French, oil-based colored inks, Charbonnel brand, to obtain the color of a pink frosted lipstick. Work is printed on STONEHENGE black paper. I used a Charles Brand industrial floor press that was manufactured in New York City. The image size is 6 ½” wide by 8 ½” high16.51cm x 21.59cmand was produced by placing two individual zinc platessize each is 4” high by 6” high or 10.16cm x 25.40cmon the press bed to create one scene. The plates required five individual etching baths in Nitric acid. All etchings were hand printed by the artist at The Center for Works on Paper in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, US. This etching is from the Di Falco series entitled, “Slot Machine Gun Assassination”, which focuses upon the death of art in Atlantic City, New Jersey, an east coast seaside resort. As a child of eight, the artist and his mother traveled to Atlantic City to hear his jazz musician father, Happy Di Falco, play at the Club Harlem, frequently with, “The Ink Spots”. The artist shot the photo, on which this etching is based, in1981, about twenty years after visiting the vibrant Club Harlem. It shows a very different “Atlantic City”, which is devoid of businesses and clubs since 1978, the year when casino gambling became legal there.“Atlantic City”, the artist explains, “now reminds me of a twilight zone of bulldozed nothingness. Moreover, those vacant acres that separate the wealthy casino strip from one of New Jersey’s poorest ghettos. The Club Harlem is now a vacant lot. Once, such stars as Louis Armstrong, Ella Fitzgerald, and Red Foxx appeared here.

Artwork Keywords:   Atlantic City, Urban Removal, Politics, Casinos, Gambling, Original Printmaking

Materials:   Etching Prints