Printmaking

A few months back I visited the studio of Deb Strong, a painter and print maker. We met at at the opening of Artist House Gallery’s “New Faces” exhibit in which we were both showing our work. I’ve been wanting to learn printmaking and thus far I’ve been completely unsatisfied with the spoon-burnished monotypes I’ve tried. They had all the appeal and quality of a home-made sock puppet, enjoyable enough but far from sophisticated. (Unless that puppet has a top hat, coat tails and a pipe, in which case I say “well played, classy puppet.”) In my DIY prints, there were subtleties in the initial inking that didn’t come through in the print. I came to find out I was missing a few steps and half-assing the ones that I did get right.

Deb has a press. She showed me several ways to do mono printing. Moistening the paper before printing was a step I mist (get it? missed…mist…) This helped the paper fibers to open up and absorb more of the inks when pressed. The press, of course, helped tremendously. With the layers of soft blankets over top and the high pressure of the rollers I get maximum squish, a technical term, and the subtleties in my ink image came through beautifully. 

Printmaking requires you to think several steps ahead. Each layer and step is preparing for the next step and every step has a proper technique. Unlike photoshop where I can create and delete layers on a whim, this is permanent. I can’t control-Z my way out of the ink.

Props to all the printmakers out there. One artist and printmaker I really enjoy is
David Hawkins

Here is one of mine –