Limited Edition Stone Lithography

An Original Art Form by Edna Hibel

Edna Hibel : The Artist and Master Stone Lithographer

Edna Hibel loves to experiment, so lithographs on porcelain are only one example of the many innovations she has created in her time. Lithography is a complicated and labor-intensive technique of painting with grease on large stone slabs, which are then used to make prints. Edna Hibel is considered a Master Stone Lithographer and master colorist who has produced over 600 editions so far, a rare achievement for any artist.

Edna Hibel is known to work on any surface that will catch paint, and her works appear on wood, silk, shells, plaster, Japanese rice paper, and clothing in addition to the more standard canvas. Edna Hibel creates her original stone lithographs in the classical methodology.

The artist draws on a series of very smoothly-ground Bavarian limestones with a grease-based pencil, a liquid with brushes, and with sharp objects which permit her to scrape away the ink she has drawn onto the stone. Each stone is millions of years old, and has a texture that is seen through the ink on the paper.

The artist draws a key stone (or major) image, and then background and additional details are drawn on other stones. Edna Hibel generally uses one stone for each color in the resulting artwork. Edna Hibel creates lithographs with up to 32 colors -- more than any other artist since the medium was invented in 1795.

Edna Hibel’s innovations in her stone lithographs includes the development of a secret process which enables her to transfer color separations using stone lithography onto porcelain. Edna Hibel's ‘Arte Ovale’ series and various plaques employ this technique.

Over the past seventy years, Edna Hibel’s sensitive, yet powerful portrayals of humanity and nature in the mediums of oil painting, drawing, lithography, serigraphy, etching, and sculpture in bronze, crystal, and porcelain, have been exhibited in major museums, galleries, universities and even palaces across four continents.

Edna Hibel’s numerous fine art and humanitarian awards include medals of honor and citations from many heads of state, academic institutions, and religions, resulting in her being widely known as an ambassador for world peace.

Edna Hibel’s inquisitive and experimental nature, combined with her impeccable draftsmanship and love for beauty, have brought a poetic lyricism and delicacy to this original art form. Her experimenting inevitably leads to the creation of a large percentage of unique proofs, many of which Edna enhances further with many other mediums.

Edna Hibel’s Prologue to Stone Lithography

There seems to be much confusion as to the difference between an original graphic and a reproduction. An original lithograph is called “original” because every image is taken, or pulled, from the artist’s own drawings. On the other hand, a reproduction is usually printed from a photographic image made on a metal plate. This is an attempt to faithfully reproduce an original work of art.

An important difference between the two methods is that an artist has the graphic as the artistic goal when working on a original graphic. An artist is not thinking of reproductions, however, when working on an original work of art in some other medium. For this reason, an original graphic of an artist has greater artistic merit than the reproductions of an original work rendered by the same artist. In addition, each original lithograph is numbered, and the artist examines and signs each one, signifying that his or her aesthetic desires are satisfied.

In the following discussion, I show as concisely as possible the steps I generally take in creating an original limited edition stone lithograph.

Edna Hibel, 1992