Invented around 1650, aquatint is a book illustration and printmaking technique that creates the effect of watercolor or ink washes:
The effect is created by dusting copperplate or other printing plates with finely powdered resin that is
then heated until the resin melts in tiny mounds that harden as they cool. Acid (aqua fortis) is applied to the metal plate and bites channels around the resin droplets. The resulting microscopic reticulation will hold more or less ink, depending upon how long or how deeply the acid is allowed to penetrate the plate.... Tones ranging from light gray to velvety black can thus be printed.
The process was overshadowed by the invention of mezzotint at approximately the same time, and it did not become popular until recipes for creating its effects were published towards the end of the 18th century in two books, Art de graver au pinceau (1773) and Découverte du procédé de graver au lavis (1780).
Aquatint produces a wide range of tonal values, and it was particularly popular during the late 18th-early 19th centuries for illustrating books containing portraits (especially caricatures and depictions of fashion) and landscapes:
The greatest master of the process was the famed Spanish artist Francisco Goya, who created four outstanding cycles of etchings that used the technique to great effect: Los Caprichos (1799); Los Desastres de la Guerra (1810–19); La Tauromaquia (1816); and Disparates (ca. 1816–23). All of these have been reprinted numerous times since their original publication:
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