Printing Day One
Day one of printing today – and ably assisted by Pecos : intern at Flatbed. Using styrene as the vehicle to hold the ink, I’m able to cut it up with a knife into shapes which are then inked and printed on a large electric press. I see it as an intaglio press however Tracy explains to me that it is a press for relief printing, as opposed to intaglio because it has a hollow top roller. Anyway, it does a great job and it’s nice to just press the button and see it do the work. I’m inking up a large sheet of plexiglass which is on the bed, inking the pieces of styrene and laying them on top. Registration is very difficult and I must discuss a better way of working this – additionally hard because I’m making prints which bleed off the paper.
Cutting the styrene
Printing on BFK Rives 35 x 45 inch paper.
I printed black, leaving a white (unprinted – colour of the paper) section that I will keep unprinted and then green and yellow. I’ll resume tomorrow or the next day.
It’s difficult to re-think my working process into a new way of working. I know what I’m doing with reduction woodcut and this is something altogether different and it exposes all the flaws in my thinking because it’s easier to hide behind process that you are familiar with.
I’m learning how to set and use the press, how to clean up, Flatbed procedures for paper, ink etc. It’s a slower process than at home and for me exposes more the emotional rollercoaster of making – anticipation, excitement, disappointment, etc.
Just black printed
Yellow and green over printed.