No press to flatten my fish
Linocut prints done in high school are responsible for a lot of impressive hand scars I reckon. So apprehension and the fear of unstoppable bleeding filled my head when I started cutting a new one recently.
The fact that the tools could be used in surgery (yes they are that sharp), had me slicing away from me and my fingers. This block was more like masonite, but is specifically for linocut prints. As it is not flexible, curves and corners were more difficult, but not impossible. I quickly gave up the idea of cutting a bazillion scales on to the barrmundi.
Next step was the inking up. Print ink is a thicker consistency than paint, and tends not to drip. You need to apply it with a special rubber roller that makes that sucking noise as it rolls over the sticky ink. The raised bits that you haven’t cut away will be the areas to hold ink. We didn’t have a big heavy press to roll the paper over the printing plate (the linocut), so results were always going to be sketchy.
I had drawn and quartered my barra, so that I could get a repeating pattern happening, rather than just one stand alone image. I was hoping that if it worked out well, I could print up some fabric for use in the backyard. An interesting aside here is that last month the largest barra was caught in Deep Creek behind our house. Even made the news in the Brisbane newspaper.
Alas, not enough pressure to make a decent print. Where’s a huge cast iron printing press when you need one!
I had a little Indian woodblock fishstamp, which I used to fill in some gaps.
I used lots of colour combos, but all turned out pretty ordinary. I eneded up liking the printing block more than the print!
To finish on a warm and fuzzy note, there was young feathery love on my fence…
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a belated happy new year to you, my friend! e.
seems like a big time investment to me. wish i had that time! well done
Gav, it was all part of my visual arts unit at uni.
I wouldn’t have voluntarily picked up the Tools of Blood and Death!
Having said that, I think I’d really like to give proper lino cut printing a go now. If you go into town, pop into KickArts (where the giant jelly babies are). They have lino cuts prints 5 meters long! Just awesome.
Popped in this morning to comment on your blog, but the chatters had overrun it.
Cheers,
Artoholic Cindy
Love the pictures of the “lovebirds”.
I have to admit I am so “bigblog-centric” I am struggling with this style of blog. But I will persist. By the way - you have been “undeleted” from my favourites. Don’t you feel special?
Tim, I am humbled by your gesture, in a Charles Manson kinda way.
You know, until I really went looking, I didn’t know how good other blog platforns were, and how bad Bigpond’s was. Bigpond uses blogs as advertising pages. They just needed free content to go in them- hence blogs.
If you want to see some really outstanding Aussie blogs, there is link which I’ll post on your blog.
Cheers,
Cindy
You certainly do get some beautiful birdlife where you are….
I do remember those tools well…I loved carving out bit`s of wood so much when I was younger my mum actually bought me a set one year….And yes they are sharp…lol
Hi Mandy,
I’m just about to do a new post about the “beautiful birdlife”. There is blood involved. I think the lino cutting tools would be kinder to my fingers….
Cheers
Artoholic Cindy
[…] Also back in Semester One (Gawd but that seems like years ago), I did a lino cut of a barra. Having no press, it turned out dismally. (see original post & linocut here) […]