Neon Demon — laser-etched acrylic masks
Hand-drawn linework, etched into clear and mirrored acrylic, backed with neon. Detail so fine that other laser shops were skipping over it.
Christina Welzer is a Brooklyn artist working in drawing, sculpture, and collage installation. Her work is about the line between solid material and light — which is how she ended up making masks out of etched acrylic and neon.
The ask
She wanted a neon mask built from her own line drawings. Everything depended on one thing: the laser-cut face had to hold the detail. She hand-draws all of it, which means far more line than a machine is comfortable cutting.
She’d tried other laser shops. In her words, they took shortcuts — patches of detail came back blurred, or skipped entirely.
What we did
Clear acrylic for the first “Neon Demon,” red acrylic mirror for “Nevermind the Flame.” Acrylic because it takes a fine etch cleanly and comes off the bed with a finished edge — no secondary step between the machine and the neon.
The work was in the setup, not the cutting: tuning power and speed so the finest strokes register without the dense areas burning out. That’s the difference between capturing a drawing and approximating it.
Result
The masks have gotten bigger and more complex with every iteration. She’s been back for years.
“I have worked with several different companies to create the neon backing for the pieces, but I don’t work with anyone but DIVISION to etch the faces.”
“The team at DIVISION consistently captures all details precisely as they were meant to be seen.”
See more of her work at christinawelzer.com or @cwelzer.
