Solarplate and screenprinting videos

Here are a couple of links to videos that hopefully are helpful to you. The first one was take by myself at the Southern Graphics Concil conference in Richmond last year. It features Janet Ballweg from Bowling Green State University demonstrating how to expose, wash out and ink a solarplate.

The second one is a demo video for those who want to build their own screenprinting studio at home. The first half shows how to coat a screen with emulsion, and how to expose and wash it. The second half gets a little more quirky with adding led-lights and sound to the freshly printed shirt.

More helpful links and videos to come in the future!

Some more pictures of the show

Here are a couple more pictures from the exhibition. We also had a write up in the campus news paper, I'll add that here when I get a chance. These first two are just pictures of the wall that explains the processes. I brought in some prints with plates, tools and a small litho stone.

Here is me doing a short talk about all the pieces in the show. Everyone was really impressed with all the prints and creativity!

Following some more closeups of the show: to start pieces by Sue Yoder. Here is what she says about her process: Aiming to achieve extreme vibrancy of color, Sue utilized LEDs for radiant light to shine through her red-saturated, monotype-printed Mylar. These lights glow from behind a light-box she built to contain them. The tree-form is a woodblock she carved and then printed on the monotype.


These two are pieces by Sandy Brunvand. Sandy's statement: These pieces come from a new body of mixed media works on paper based on drawings, etchings, wood engravings, woodcuts and relief prints made from solar plates. The images of the dried plant forms and landscape are found along the trail. These are assembled, along with drawings, sketches, and lines and forms constructed from other elements, into a finished whole. I am very interested in the texture and translucency of paper, especially thin handmade paper from Japan, Bhutan and India. When coated with beeswax they take on additional qualities of texture, heft, color, and light. I am especially drawn to how these papers combine with each other when layered, and how stapling adds a dimension of texture and line (reminiscent of the process marks in the woodcuts). The delicate lines created by traditional printmaking techniques and by drawing juxtaposed with the harsh, yet beautiful, line created by a stapler, make an unusual field of textures. The mark of the staple adds a functional element as well as a formal one in these pieces. The new addition of my dog’s black hair as line and value add yet another personal element to the work. He’s at my side on the trail everyday as well as in my studio. I have struggled to keep his hair off my artwork for years and most recently out of the sticky wax. It slowly dawned on me that perhaps it was supposed to be a line on the paper. Not something to be brushed away in frustration, but something to be appreciated for its own beauty and purpose. I find that I have become more and more obsessed with lines and marks. I continually experiment to find new types of line with interesting qualities.

The pieces on the right are by Kristen Bartel (right) and Brian Gonzales (left). Their statements:
Kristen Bartel- Monotype, digital, drawing My work includes both digital and tradition printmaking technique paired with a variety of drawing materials which create abstract and absurdly systematic prints. These materials include both the conventional and alternative. Original monotypes are first digitally scanned to create a workable matrix that is then realized through a digital print on drawing paper. This print acts as a structure on which to build upon with lithographs, intaglios and drawing. The digital file can then be altered without the loss of information from the original to create a second, third or fourth print. The act and making become tangential and relieves the matrix of the burdensome fate of degradation.

Brian Gonzales – Monotype, lithography, digital, glitter Soy De Tu Sangre, Soy Parte De Ti This print began as a monotype pulled off an ink slab after printing a different image. Brian found the colors and textures interesting so he scanned the monotype, made some adjustments in Photoshop, and printed an edition of digital prints to be used as the foundation for the final print. He then continued by printing nine layers of color using Sharpie Pronto Plate Lithography. (Pronto plates are a thick acrylic film that acts as a surface for a lithograph) Déjà Vu The majority of this image was printed using Sharpie Pronto Plate Lithography. In order to create the reflective quality in the vertical stripe Brian dusted the print with gold pigment powder while the ink was still wet.

Satan's Camaro is a collaboration between Lenore Thomas and Justin Strom:
The goal of our collaboration is to approach and create artwork in a way that is outside of our individual work. Collaboration requires all parties involved to see things in new ways, to both compromise and push the bounds of the creators and the artwork. The piece we created here combines our individual ideas and aesthetics to make a piece that involves opposites: organic verses mechanical, black and white verses color, hard and soft. Despite their seeming opposition these elements form a cohesive whole, functioning together in one space. Process: We currently mix water-based screen printing with applied surfaces of smoke, stenciling and branding.

Ted Ollier does some really nice shaped plate relief prints. He says: My shaped plate relief prints began as an experiment with shapes, rather than process; I was curious to see what would happen if I cut a plate with a jeweler's saw in order to depict an area: specifically, the Mediterranean Sea. I created a silhouette in Photoshop and printed it on a laser printer to use as a template, affixing it to the plate with spray adhesive. Since I'd done tabletop metalworking and jewelry making as part of my degree the cutting of the shape was a simple, if laborious process. I used an etching press because my whole intention was to etch the surface of the plate once it was cut. However, when I pulled a proof using rollup ink, the black surface coupled with the embossing under high pressure made an end result that I was quite taken with.

I started with copper, but have switched to aluminum and zinc with the rising cost of copper. The plates are not etched in any way; I smooth out the edges with sandpaper and needle files but the surface only has to carry the ink, not the art. The rich black and the subtle relief of the embossing add an aesthetic quality to the print so they have a tactile quality, as well as a design quality.

With most of these shaped plate prints I am interested in highlighting shapes and images that are rendered invisible through familiarity or context. Thus, the geographic series highlights the complexities of features we might never see otherwise; the infrastructure series demonstrates the poetry available in the commercial urban landscape; and the geometry series attempts to bring humor and playfulness to dry academic subjects.

Jennifer Jenkins
Soft Sculptures: Before constructing the three-dimensional form, the surface markings are created through screen-printing and machine embroidery. The majority of my printed forms originate from graphite and India ink drawings in addition to mono-prints. These textures, shapes and diagrams are further developed digitally before being transferred to the screens. The printed silk is then backed with cotton/polyester quilt batting. These two layers are then bound together by a random network of machine embroidery. Sections of this fabric are used to construct the outer shell of the sculptural forms, which are then stuffed with scrap quilt batting.

Mariana Depetris had three beautiful pieces in the show.

Technically, I find the possibilities of printmaking endless and I am never satisfied with only one process for the whole piece. These three pieces have layers of three harmonic colors in relief, followed by screen printing -four colors-, letterpress and inkjet. Then I dip the pieces in encaustic medium, which is Dammar resin and purified white beeswax. This makes the piece translucent and also seals the piece. Finally, with a sgrafitto technique and stippling, bright oil stick colors are inlayed so that the piece is completed.

Last but not least, Jeff Dell had three great pieces in the show.

Jeff says: Both of these pieces begin with traditional screen printing with acrylic inks (the background layers). Then Plastisol is used with a thick capillary film applied to the screen, which can deposit a thicker layer of ink. With care, this can also be printed in multiple layers, building up the surface to create a low-relief screen print.

Addition Jan 22, I found the article in the school news paper online, you can read it here.

Old Print- New Trick exhibition is up!

I am happy to say that the exhibition is up and looks very nice. Even on opening day, when I was finishing up a couple of last minute things, students were already coming in and looking at the prints. Above is a picture from the back corner, and below from the opposite corner.

There will be an article in thursdays Inkwell (campus news paper) about the show. I'll try to add some snippets if I can get my hands on it. I am so excited, so far I have gotten great feedback.

I hope to remember to take some pictures at the reception. Two of the artists, Mariana Depetris and Jennifer Jenkins will be attending and giving short talks about their work.

Below is the view from the door.

Posters for Exhibition Done

I worked hard on these all week and finally finished, just in time to take a work-free Christmas vacation! They will be printed as posters for the Old Print-New Tricks exhibition for January. I was going to adhere them to foam core, and after the exhibition, put them up in the printmaking room. If you would like to have the posters for your class, email me and I can send you the pdf file.

Moving Jitters

Its been a hard with trying to make some art lately. School, holidays, house guests, emptying my studio to rip carpet out and put flooring in. Oh, I didn't know that much stuff could fit in one room... Now everything is all stacked and mixed up. The good thing that came out of it though was that I organized and photographed all the editions that I had in my flat files. Now i have to edit the photos and hopefully post some new ones to my website at some point next year.

We are moving across the country to Seattle area in January, after I put up my curated show at AASU. I did have time to make and order the postcard tonight, so here it is. more to come as we progress.

I also took part in two portfolios in the last couple of weeks. I make linocuts at home for both of them, I figure they turned out pretty good. The mouse is for the AASU beginning printmaking class portfolio and the antsy is for Saltgrass Printmakers portfolio in Salt Lake City, Utah.

Telfair Art Fair

The Telfair Museum is hosting its 14th Annual Art Fair on November 7-9th. The fair is one of the museum's largest annual fundraisers, with a juried art show and sale that showcases original artwork by painters, sculptors, photographers, potters, jewelers, and more. This year’s much-anticipated event features the work of more than eighty artists from the Savannah area and across the nation. I know at least Deb Oden will be representing printmakers with a booth of her own.
Three of my works were accepted to the juried Open Art tent, a new category initiated last year which showcases the work of talented emerging and student artists. (Works are going to be Missing Winter, USDA Choice and Refined Beef)
I am also doing another holiday sale bazaar on Ft Stewart in two weeks, so I need to get ready for that... hope to sell some prints too, busy, busy, busy

Exhibition coming up

A couple of my works were accepted into the upcoming juried exhibition titled Sustainable Source.

Sustainable Source is a show hosted by Longwood University’s Art Department and the American Democracy Project and it features works that highlight the theme sustainability and the resourcefulness of international contemporary printmakers and papermakers.

The works accepted are one of my light boxes and a couple of my small booklets (above) from 2006. The show opens this friday Sept. 29th and closes Oct 24th.

I am also working on a couple of commissions right now, I was going post pictures of them in a couple of days.

I also have to mention a couple of printmaking resources I ran into this week. One of them is another blog, Dean Clark's printmaking blog. He works for the Graphic Chemical company, and has updates on new materials coming out, conferences and other neat things related to printmaking.

Another website, Archival Methods, is a store that sells archival supplies-boxes, interleaving etc. They have very reasonable prices, and right now you can receive 15% off on your purchases. *CODE # 12066 for 15% off your next order*.(Valid until 12/31/2008)

Lastly a nontoxic printmaking website, with a lot of helpful information can be found at http://www.nontoxicprint.com/.