Tiny Moose challenge

Here’s a wood engraving of mine I found amongst my stuff in the studio of a baby moose. This is a very small postage stamp sized print ( 1 3/4 x 1 3/8 inches). I did this one a long time ago but it still seems attractive to me.

As you can see it is executed in a rough scratchy kind of way. It was done on end-grain maple before I had the use of boxwood. Now I’ve got more box than I know what to do with. Anyway, I like this little guy on one level but on another I’m not sure about what appears to be a rough approach to cutting the block. Not sure what I had in mind when I did it so long ago.

So, I’m trying it again with a more formalized approach . Here’s what I’ve got so far…

It’s backwards to the first one since I did an offset transfer to the new block surface. However, I think I may have screwed up here. Not enough contrast between its head and ears to the background. I’ll try lightening around that area. I want to continue with the same background motif, maybe I should have left the whole background black. Lots of problems for a few square inches of space.

I’ll post the result.

Related posts:

1. Eric Bergman
2. Paul Landacre on Wood Engraving
3. Boxwood
4. Box of Box
5. History of Wood Engraving