This week has been taken up with more print trials and thoughts about my cast of characters as well as some thesis reading.

I have only made a few proper intaglio printed collagraphs before, usually preferring to print card plates as relief prints. But there is much to love about the intaglio method especially in the hands of someone as outstanding as Katherine Jones. I attended her workshop this weekend which was a fascinating insight into her working methods.
Courses given by master printers are both inspirational and frustrating, because they make it all seem so simple.
It isn’t…it so SO isn’t!

However the trials I made will be very useful and I am beginning to understand how I can combine printing methods to created the images and effects I want. There is much to learn. These are some trials from the weekend.

Fish are always a nice design-y subject to play with. These fish actually do have a special significance for the project.

Two inkings of the same plate. This time a larger A3 plate.

You can achieve some very beautiful, if accidental, effects.

At the moment, every time I lift the paper away from the plate to reveal a print, it’s a complete surprise. If anything lovely happens it is purely accidental. Hopefully that will change and I will have a little more control.

I carried on playing when I returned home and tried to make some systematic comparison plates using slightly different methods and materials

Home trials with different inking

Trials with different plates to compare marks and inking and surface.

But it’s messy! I am not yet sure about collagraphs. They are thirsty for ink, laborious to ink up, and very very messy. Or I should say I am very messy, despite gloves. Me, my clothes, the paper, the press and the house are all covered in ink.

The Characters
Then I am also beginning to think about the characters. They include 17th century explorers, botanists, gardeners, herbalists, doctors and apothecaries. The process you choose to use can really change how you approach the imagery. I am playing with ideas, with methods, scale and imagery to find out what might suit. In arty terms its called “visual language”!…

Trialling a simple bold lino print of a face.No one in particular ..just a trial.

2 figure sketches and accompanying linos as yet unprinted.

They will hopefully appear in some guise next week….

Labels: collagraph, print, printmaking