Central Florida Printmakers

relief printing

The term Relief Printing generally describes the process of carving or scratching a flat surface so that all that remains is the design intended to be printed. Woodcut, also know as Woodblock, is the oldest and most traditional method of producing printed art. Dating back to the Han Dynasty, before 220 AD, a three color flower was printed on silk. Whether printed on fabric or paper, this method of printmaking grew in popularity in east Asia, spreading through out Eurasia by 1000 AD and eventually into Europe around the 13th century.

In the 1800’s, the invention of linoleum as a flooring material led to it’s use as a soft, easy to carve material for printmakers. Linocuts are easily the most affordable and least complex way to make a series of prints. Like woodblocks, they can be produced with or without a press.

Dry Point Etching is the technique of engraving on a plate like copper, zinc or plexiglass. A sharp, pointed tool is used to produce lines or furrows that retain ink when printed. This method is attributed to German artists beginning in the 15th-century, and made popular by artists such as Albrecht Durer and Rembrandt van Rijn. Soon after the invention of dry point, acid was introduced to add texture to Etchings. An etching that uses acid is called an Aquatint.

STONE LITHOGRAPHY

Not to be confused with commercial offset lithography, Stone Lithography is a printmaking process where a design is drawn on a flat limestone slab (or special metal plate) and affixed by means of a chemical reaction. Invented in Germany in 1796, it was originally used to reproduce music scores. It quickly grew in popularity for both fine art and commercial use. The fine grain texture of limestone makes it well suited to create values of gray and colors. Lithography requires a great deal of strength for lifting, inking and printing the stones and to move stones to storage. While some artists worked directly on the limestone, others would contract with a skilled printer, who transferred the original artwork to the stone. Each color requires a separate stone, making the alignment, also known as registration, of many colors a challenge. The printer often took credit for this difficult task by placing a signature mark within the print itself. Note the red mark in the lower right corner of Edward Penfield’s horse print pictured above. Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec is well known for his series of Moulin Rouge lithography posters.

SERIGRAPH, ALSO KNOWN AS SILKSCREEN

Silk Screen printing is a workhorse in the printmaking world. First invented by the Chinese in 221 A.D. it was used to stencil images on fabric. Today, the process involves stretching a durable fabric, like nylon, over a wood frame. The screen is then manipulated so that ink can only be squeegeed through open areas. Typically a new screen needs to be created for each color. From the early 1900’s in England, silk screen printing was used commercially to print designs on fabric and wallpaper. In 1938, a group of New York artists began experimenting with silk screen printing on paper and coined the term Serigraph for fine art prints. In the 1960s and 70s serigraph printing experienced an explosion in popularity.