Block Printing - Linocuts

in this video we're going to take a look at a form of relief printmaking commonly referred to as linocuts let's take a look at a few of the things that you'll need first of course you'll need a bit of linoleum you can pick this up at the local art store you'll need a few cutting tools to cut the linoleum we'll also be using block printing ink we'll be using the water-based ink and paper rag paper is preferred but any paper will work soft graphite which is optional we'll be using it to transfer the image a glass plate on which to put the ink on a brayer or a roller and either a wooden spoon a printing press or a baron here's a look at the linoleum that I picked up at the local art store in this case the top portion is a piece of linoleum and it's been adhered to a block this makes it a bit easier to work with I've also went ahead and created a sketch using only lines on a piece of paper that's exactly the same size as the linoleum since we've created a separate sketch we can easily transfer this sketch to the linoleum surface ensuring that we don't spend a lot of time sketching out our idea on the linoleum surface to transfer the image we'll use a bit of soft graphite in this case I'm using a general layout pencil which is about equivalent to a 4b pencil will apply graphite to the entire back portion of the drawing and then we can apply the drawing directly on top of the linoleum block we'll use a bit of masking tape to adhere it in place so it doesn't move once we start the transfer process once our drawing is secured to the linoleum block we can use a harder lead pencil or perhaps a ballpoint pen to trace over all of the lines of the drawing the pressure that is placed on the pencil or the ballpoint pen will cause the softer graphite that we applied on the back of the drawing to be transferred to the linoleum surface it's important to understand that the drawing that we create well the finished Block Grant rather will be the reverse of the drawing that we've created it's especially important to be mindful of this if you have letters or numbers in your drawing now we can remove our drawing to find that our image has been successfully transferred to the linoleum surface now before we start cutting the block we need to think about how our finished print will be translated most of us are accustomed to creating dark marks on a white surface as drawing papers after all are white and most mark making materials are dark this means that we may have to think in Reverse in some situations remember the areas that we remove will not receive any ink so they'll be the color of the paper so if we were to create a print of this image all the white areas would need to be removed and all of the dark areas would need to be left on the block and if the opposite was true and we wanted to create a reverse of this image we would remove all the areas that are white and leave all the areas that are dark this concept of course is incredibly important because it determines what we will cut from the block and what we will leave now let's take a closer look at the tools that we'll use to remove portions of the linoleum from the block this particular set of blades made by speedball includes a handle and a variety of different blades some of the blades are designed to make precise cuts that don't remove a lot of linoleum while some will make less precise marks remove more the linoleum from the surface the dull end of the blade can be inserted into the end of the handle and tightened to keep in place make sure that your blade is nice and tight inside and that you've placed the blade on the outer portion now it's time to start making cuts since we'll be printing on white paper with black block printing ink we'll be removing the areas that we want to be white in the final print it's important to make cuts away from your body linoleum block printing can become dangerous if you start making cuts towards your body or towards others that may be around you it's also important to keep your hands away from the area that you're cutting occasionally the blade will slide and if you're not careful you could hurt yourself it might be helpful to slowly wiggle the blade as you make cuts linoleum can be very tough and hard to cut a little bit of wiggling helps to remove the linoleum from the surface for precise cuts you may switch over to the blade using the blade you can make initial cuts around areas that you want precise lines and edges then you can go back with a less precise blade and remove the linoleum completely but leave a nice sharp edge around the areas that you've cut with the blade now while linocuts can be very precise and detailed they don't have to be in fact simple prints are often very aesthetically pleasing keep in mind however that no matter how intricate or how simple your print is you need to take your time with your cuts this is a slow process that requires attention you need to make sure that you don't accidentally cut areas that you need to leave raised there's really not a way to fix an area once you've made a cut and removed a portions of the linoleum you may decide to leave some of your cuts visible these various will translate as texture in the final print in this case I'm trying to remove as much as possible I want to create a clean print but even with a clean print there will be small imperfections we'll discuss these in a moment in a later stage of the video for now we'll continue on with the cutting process and as we do we need to consider again the reverse of things the areas that will be dark in the areas that will be light in many cases in order to see outlines we may need to add additional light blinds around some of the edges we can create these light lines using a smaller and more precise blade during the process if you're curious how your final print will be translated you could take a sheet of paper and lay it over the top and do a rubbing using a soft piece of graphite or perhaps some charcoal all the raised areas will come through in this rubbing giving you an idea of what your print will look like but ultimately there's no way to really see or understand what your finished print will look like until we roll some ink on the surface a few last cuts are made to remove the final pieces of linoleum with these last pieces removed we can use a brush to remove all the excess smaller pieces of linoleum if you don't have a brush you can also use your hand and your fingers to remove all the small bits now we'll grab our block printing ink again this is water-based block printing ink by speedball next we'll spread a small dab of the ink over the glass plate in the upper portion then we'll use our brayer which is sometimes referred to as a roller and move the ink around on the surface we want to create an even distribution of ink on the brayer will move the brayer in multiple directions to create an even distribution you'll know when you have a good amount of ink on the surface when you start to hear a sticky sound or a tacky sound on the brayer the ink is very sticky and you'll notice this sound immediately then we can go to our linoleum block and start spreading the ink it may take a few passes to completely cover the block here again we'll want to be listening for that tacky or sticky sound on the block we'll grab a bit more ink and continue to apply it to the linoleum block service again you'll probably need to move the brayer in multiple directions to evenly cover the surface will only bring down enough ink that we need for the particular application we want to make sure that we don't apply too much ink to the block surface we'll continue applying the ink until we have even coverage over the entire block now we can lay paper over the top of the block to create our first print in this case I've prepared a sheet of paper that measures six inches by eight inches which is just slightly larger than our five by seven block I'll lay it in place without moving it once I've placed it and then use a wooden spoon to apply pressure on the back this process is called burnishing we're basically applying pressure to the back of the piece of paper allowing the ink to transfer from the block to the paper itself now I'm using a wooden spoon for the burnishing process but a baron can also be used and of course if you're using a printing press and burnishing is not necessary we can remove our first print and take a look at what we've got now since these are handmade prints you can expect some imperfections we can evaluate what we have with our first print and here I can see that there's some areas that appear a bit Bobby for lack of a more technical term this means that I've applied too much ink to the surface so let's create another print I'll go through the same steps and then remove our second print now in this print I haven't applied enough ink the lines are much clearer and crisper but there's not enough ink on the surface these are two common mistakes will continue to create a series of prints and during the process we'll find the right amount of ink and the right amount of pressure placed by the burnishing process this one's a little bit better but not quite there after a few more prints I was able to arrive at a series of suitable prints here's a look at one of them now linoleum bought printing is a lot of fun it's slow and tedious but it always pays off in the end I hope you enjoyed this video and I hope it helped you out remember if you want to learn more about drawing and painting and other art making techniques visit the virtual instructor com

Channel: Drawing & Painting - The Virtual Instructor

Views: 493,278

Rating: 4.8669415 out of 5

Keywords: block printing, printmaking, relief, linoleum, linocuts, linocut, how to, lesson, art, tutorial, Woodblock Printing (Visual Art Medium)

Id: TiQPOIwObrQ

Length: 12min 7sec (727 seconds)

Published: Sat Nov 21 2015