When Photographers are Blinded II

The 2010 second iteration of the photographers and eagles motif uses etching directly on wood — an unconventional pairing in which the wood block stands in for the copper plate, producing line through carving rather than acid biting. The technique sits between intaglio and relief printing and gives line a different physical quality from copper etching: rougher, with grain showing through. The 'II' in the title indicates a return to a subject Heyman would develop further in the 2011 four-process version of the same theme. Made earlier than its more elaborate counterpart, this print presents the central image — photographers and the symbolic eagle — through a single technical register rather than the layered multi-plate approach. Within Heyman's 2009–2011 sequence on press freedom and American iconography, this is the simpler, more graphically direct statement of the motif. The wood substrate also visually rhymes with the press blocks of newspaper printing, an association consistent with the title's subject and one Heyman tends to draw on across the series.