The art of the Blockprint!

Hi Subscriber!

Really hoping the first couple of weeks in this new year

(a leap year - for those who think about that, an extra day for the year!) are going well for you.

For me, at the last minute I decided to take a blockprinting workshop, here in Juneau, taught by my friend and (terrific) artist, Jim Heumann.

Each Saturday morning in January, eighteen hearty/hardy?

(because it is winter ... and it is snowing here)

students will be learning about the age-old artform of blockprint.

It is thought that wood-block printing began in China 4,000 years ago.

"Spots" crystal beetles by Javier Jaén

(i drew my grid with Sketch Squares, see end of this newsletter for info)

I try to read the New Yorker mag (it comes weekly ... hard to keep up!) and I love the "spots" where an artist

designs tiny drawings interspersed in spots around the magazine.

I was so happy to see these little crystal "beetles"

in the October 2023 issue.

So happy that I cut them out and pasted into a grid* that I drew in my sketchbook, and then

since there were 15 grid squares, but only 10 "spots",

I sketched in my own beetles.

Anyway, this is all to explain that the inspiration for my first lino block print for this workshop was these New Yorker spot crystal beetles.

My carving tools are Flexcut brand.

To spread out the block print ink, a brayer is used.

extremely sharp!

brayer

We began the class working on a single color block print.

1st block carved

In our second class, we had a choice to make either a 2-block print, or a reduction print. These could be two colors, or more if you were brave.

I chose the 2-block print for simplicity.

The tricky part of a 2-block is that you need to get the "register" correct so your prints will line up. I inked my original block and printed it on paper and placed a new lino block in the "register corner" and printed a second, really a mirror image print,

directly on the second block with that inked up paper.

With this block I began to carve again. Since I wanted the bodies to stay red, and the antennae and legs to be black, I had to carve away the bodies on the second block.

carving the second block

on a bench hook

2nd beetle block

Just a note about the other way to make 2 or more colors in your block print. Reduction linocut is a technique for achieving multiple colors in a single print while only using one block.

You carve one layer, print it across your edition, carve some more, print again on the same pages, and repeat as needed.

I will try this one day,

but just didn't feel like I could cut away my beetles!

Crystal Beetles

2-block lino cut

5x7 inches

I really love how the crystal beetles turned out!

I also carved "thank you" on a block, so I can make some thank you cards for general purpose.

And thank you for reading about my block printing class experience. I have made many of our own block print Christmas cards for years, but I just did it on my own. Learning more about the techniques and tools will help so much!

There are two more Saturday classes and I might pop in to let you in on what happened in those, but for now, I am just happy to share another way I love to make art, and useful art too!

me with the Sketch Squares

* The grid that I mentioned was created by a U.K. artist named Faye Bridgwater. She calls them Sketch Squares.

Here is the link to check the grid out, and her fab paintings:

Sketch Squares

ps Stay tuned for a new blogpost (Studio Journal post) for my Blogiversary! Coming in a week or so!

on the menu line at

TeriRobusStudio