PRINTER: Hope Sufferance Press, London

PUBLISHER: National Gallery, London
After a two year absence from the medium, Hughie O'Donoghue returned to printmaking in 1991 as Artist in Residence of The National Gallery in London. The Gallery was publishing a portfolio of prints celebrating their Artists in Residence programme, and O'Donoghue chose to respond to Titian's The Death of Actaeon, a particularly celebrated work in the collection. Technically, the image was made in an alloy of hard-ground and then dry-point, and it has a combination of direct biting with acid and softer-edged pools of oil of spike. In all, some twenty state proofs were made before the approved state which was then printed in two tones, warm and cool, which were mixed by the printer. Due to the immense complication of this process, each impression of Actaeon after Titian varies slightly.

Other artists participating in the portfolio were: Paula Rego; Maggi Hambling; Kevin O'Brien; Madlena Strinberg; Jock McFadyen; June Redfern; Michael Porter; Philip Mead.