Top Three Posts

Blogger counts each time a post has been viewed and of my 80 posts, the Eco Bundling - OMG post has received the most by far - 102 views and climbing. This post has been viewed almost every day since I posted it! My post Papermaking Adventures: Water Retting is second with 87 views and Experimental Printmaking I (carving into Masonite) is third with 81 views. In general, most other posts get anywhere from 6 to 35 views. I suppose these three topics have very little written about them although India Flint and her eco-bundling technique is getting more popular every day. She has spent much time traveling and conducting workshops and posts on her blog regularly. The popularity of the technique has folks searching for more, I suppose.

To those who have searched for information on these topics, please leave a comment and let me know if you found what I wrote to be helpful and share something about your own experiments and experiences. Thanks!

Queen Anne's Lace & Wildflowers

Continuing with where I left off with the post, Transitioning, here is what I've done so far with that initial drawing on the linoleum.

coloring in what is to be removed

the finished block

applying ink

I plan to overprint these with drawings of monarda, echinacea, goldenrod and other wildflowers.

Punica ornamentum aureolis

I was asked to donate one of my prints to the 2nd WPKN Artfest Auction to be held during the annual City-Wide Open Studios in New Haven. At first I thought of donating one of the drypoint etchings/chin colle prints I did of the blueberry drawing for last year's Blueberry Summer silkscreen. Since I donated one of these silkscreens to last year's auction, I decided against it. Instead, I chose to revisit the linoleum block I made for an earlier print, Punica ornamentum. I have wanted to use this block again. I carved out the background lines that created the original prints, mixed up a maroon ink and hand printed on several different handmade papers. Deciding on the one printed on flax paper, I added gold acrylic paint to accent parts of the design. Next I looked through previously printed papers intended for backgrounds and collage and found a lace print I made from a collograph on my handmade gampi.

In keeping with the concept of giving this a fictitious botanical name, I made this a variety of the original. This is entitled Punica ornamentum aureolis meaning Golden Ornamental Pomegranate.

Transitioning: Good-bye Summer, Hello Autumn

Summer rarely hangs on until the last day here in southern New England. Fall is in the air usually a good week before the official autumnal equinox. The same is true this year. Since last Friday, the temperatures have been in the mid 60's F and cooler at night. The sun has set by 7 p.m. The leaves are beginning to change color and some are even beginning to fall.

Yes, the sunny, warm, seemingly endless days of summer have come to an end. I really enjoyed this summer. I will miss it, but I also look forward to the days of transition ahead. Transitioning from shorts to jeans; from sandals to socks and closed shoes; from wet hair to blow dried; from whites, yellows and bright greens of summer home decor to rusts, browns and dark greens of autumn; from margaritas to apple cider, cinnamon and bourbon; from papermaking to printmaking.


I am once again taking the Monotype/Monoprint class at Creative Arts Workshop. I start this evening. I am going to build on what I started in the summer class and start new projects as well. Today I am working on a simple design of wildflowers that I will cut from linoleum and use primarily as a background. I am planning to do a series of prints featuring wildflowers on the naturally dyed cotton paper I made. If I can figure out how to thicken the ink I made from Viburnum acerifolium berries and Salvia officinalis, I will use these as well. If not, I have other projects in mind for those.

Design on "wonder-cut" linoleum before carving

Experimental Printmaking - Phase III

The last phase involved carving details into the images on the plates, which up until this point had been silhouettes (which I love the look of and will do more in the future). After the final carving, I reassembled the blocks in order and printed it.









Cutting the plates to 6" by 8" with the use of a table saw took off an eighth of an inch from all sides. Butted together, the design was slightly distorted. So for the next print, I spaced them to compensate for this.












For this next print, I randomly placed the plates down on the press bed.











And for the final print, I chose to print it in alternating colors.





I loved this project! My professor was unsure of my project all semester because there were many challenges along the way. In the end he said that he was quite impressed with what I had done!
Lessons I have learned:
1. If I want to print a large carved piece, I should use linoleum instead.
2. Carving tools must be kept sharp. I had so much trouble carving in Phase III because I was using dull tools. We tried to sharpen them, but I think it was too late!
3. Masonite isn't absorbent so at times it was difficult to roll the ink on the plate. I had some problems with the various inks, but I don't believe I figured out exactly what the causes were.

I have ordered some linoleum blocks and several types of linoleum and woodcarving tools, as well as a sharpening stone from Dick Blick. The order should be arriving this week. I look forward to using the blocks from this project incorporated with future designs.

Experimental Printmaking - Phase II

I would have loved to continue printing with this large block, but I had a deadline and two additional phases, so moved on to the next phase. Since the board was 18" by 24", I had it cut into 9 equal 6" by 8" plates.

My intention was to overlap the designs with transparent layers of ink. It took several brands and types of inks to find one that worked well. It was difficult to get transparency with the water-based block printing inks and even the water-based etching inks I was using wasn't creating the transparency I was looking for. I bought a sampler kit of Faust Aqua-Line inks. These are lovely, creamy inks that I was introduced to in a Silk Aquatint class I took at Creative Arts Workshop in New Haven, CT. Mixing the colors with the transparent medium finally gave me what I was looking for. I experimented with hand printing, using the press at school and with the small hand press I have at home (which I bought from Jerry's Artarama) and with different types of papers, including some of my handmade paper.
Here are a few samples:

Experimental Printmaking - Phase I

This past semester, continuing with my printmaking studies, I took a class entitled Experimental Printmaking. It was up to me to decide what I wanted to do. The following photos are a summary of the project.

I wanted to make a large woodblock print that I could print from and later cut into smaller sized blocks and print from again. So the design had to be such that each of the blocks could be stand alone, though become somewhat abstract because of this. My design idea was the Tree of Life often depicted in old textiles. I created a design that had elements modeled after Jacobean embroidery and other textile samples that I have.

I wanted the block to be 18" x 24", so the first decision was finding a wood that would be suitable and available in this size. My options were few. I experimented with carving birch plywood and 1/4" Masonite boards. I decided to use the Masonite.

Carving was not difficult in the beginning. I realize now that it is because my tools were sharp.







After spending almost two months carving the design, I was only a little more than half way done. I decided to use a dremil to help speed things up. This turned out to be a learning experience because each type of tool made very different types of marks.


The left side is hand carved and the right side is Dremil carved.

I went back over the Dremiled areas with the hand tools to make a more uniform design.

Now that I was satisfied with the carving, I printed
several two-color prints.

This completed Phase I on this printmaking project.