Showing posts with label printmaking. Show all posts
Showing posts with label printmaking. Show all posts

Saturday, January 18, 2014


I have finished all the 6" x 6" monoprints need ed to fill my sketchbook. I am happy with them all except now my book won't close. But it's a learning curve. I'll have to solve that issue next time around. These are three prints I did using my brand new stencils from Stencil Girl.  Mary Beth Shaw has collaborated with many artists to design really wonderful, interesting stencils for artists and crafters to use.


Three Birds on Stilts


Landscape

                                                         
                                                         Heart

Tuesday, January 14, 2014



More mono prints today. I am almost finished filling the small 7 x7 sketchbook. It really looks neat with all the prints together in one book. My larger "real"  8" x 10"  Gelli Plate arrived a few days ago and I am ready to put that to work. I wanted to work small first, because I could work faster and figure out some of the problems (challenges) I was having with resolution, color mixing and just getting an image I was looking for.
The 6" x 6" size work great for that.

 I find that if I set a goal for myself with certain parameters, I tend to stick it out, and progress, at least a little. If you need a break from the intenseness that can come from painting, try mono- printing. You just can't worry to much about perfection. Surprise is the name of the game. You really can't make corrections - just do overs. And that alone teaches you lot of things. Like patience, technique, and not too take your work too seriously. You can make an image in just minutes - which I really LIKE! Fun, fun, fun! All you need is a gelatin plate, a ink roller, acrylic paint and paper. Stencils are optional because you can draw on the play and use objects as stencil.

Here is one done with two prints. First the background was a ghost print - which is the second print made from the original plate. With the gelli plate these all come out very soft and watery looking. The second color was from the first print, using a 6 x6" flower stencil from   The Crafter's Worskhop. You can see from the purple edges that my home made gelatin plate is shrinking and getting pretty wonky around the edges. This won't happen with the store bought plate from Gelli Arts.

This is a photo of two prints pasted into the sketchbook. I really like the way the purple (Dioxazine Purple) looks over the olive green color.

Monday, September 23, 2013

Doodle print

Last week I was with some friends and I ended up taking my styrofoam plate and using it to doodle on with a ballpoint pen. I have used styrofoam lots of times with the kids at the YMCA Art Camp so I knew it would make a pretty clean print. I was happy with the results. I also spent an hour or so looking at carved stamps on Pinterest.  If you aren't using Pinterest you should check it out to see if you would like it.

Any way I took an old  Blick E-Z Cut Printing Blocks that was partially carved already and cut some smaller shapes. That's the circle, leaf and stem shape you can see next to the E-Z block. It all came together really fast and I can't wait to do more.

Lesson learned:  Don't under estimate  your doodles - put them to work!