CRACKED CONCH | Niki Butcher

Key Largo © 1989

Photographic Story I was going through a box of some of my old original hand-painted images and came across this one. I had photographed and hand-painted the photograph of this old restaurant back in 1989. It was sitting alongside the two-lane road outside Key Largo on a very valuable piece of property. I loved the place because it was old Florida, and I am glad I photographed it when I did because shortly afterward the property was sold and it was torn down. The Art of Hand Painting Black and White Photographs Niki prints her images on fiber-base black and white mat surface paper in the darkroom, then using Q-tips and cotton balls, she applies a thin coat of oil paint over the surface allowing the image to gently be seen through the oil paint. Archival Print Making Niki’s open edition gicleé artwork is printed on Sunset Bright Velvet Rag matte finish paper using eight archival inks. A state-of-the-art Epson Stylus Pro printer creates deep, rich dark values that hold subtle detail in the shadows as well as bright vivid colors that are truly tropical.