It was all going so well… You might remember when I last posted (in January) that I was making some new linocut prints.
Work chugged along slowly, at a rate of one layer of ink per week. I started with the pale yellowish colour that you can see on the reeds and wings, then a slightly deeper orangy shade, then brown before adding a pale blue section at the top.
Unfortunately I ran into a registration problem when I’d nearly finished the prints! ‘Registration’ means making sure the different layers of ink line up properly.
I think what happened was that the rollers of my little printing press squished the lino block (which has had its surface area much reduced) and distorted it so that the last layer of ink went on slightly wonky.
AAAAAARGHHHHHHH is a rough approximation of what I said at the time.
You can see really clearly on the left-hand edge of the print how the darkest shade of brown doesn’t line up with the paler colours underneath.
If I can summon up the energy to try again, I will see if printing by hand avoids the registration problem. This will mean inking up the block, putting the paper on top and then rubbing the back of the prints with a ‘baren’ to transfer the ink that way. It’s more physical than using the press to do the hard work of applying pressure but it might be worth a try…
Not everything has gone wrong lately. I drew this little green-tailed sunbird to give as a present, and I am happy to say it was well-received. Pencils are definitely my comfort zone.
I am also pleased to report that we have a good quantity of frogspawn in our garden pond. The peak count of frogs was 20 and there has been a LOT of croaking in the evenings. You can see that the black dots in the oldest spawn are elongating so maybe I can look forward to seeing the first free-swimming tadpoles in a couple of weeks.
Also, hooray for blossom (blackthorn here, I think)
One unexpected benefit of my printmaking failure is that while I’ve downed tools on this particular project for now, it’s left a bit of a gap where I can think about what I would really enjoy doing.
Don’t get me wrong – I do love the challenges of printmaking but maybe I’ll take this as a hint from the printmaking gods that I should Keep It Simple. It could be time to design some more black and white prints that should be less time-consuming and require no registration… something more like this snipe.
I so feel for you! And yes using lino on an etching press is fraught with peril. I remember a framer friend telling me about someone who had printed a large edition of a big single colour print, and as she brought in successive ones to be framed he was finding they were getting longer because the block had been stretched. Yikes.
I’ve seen illustrators faking slight misregistrations to get that handprinted feel so I think you’re good, it’s just a part of the look. A stylistic choice you obviously intended. Are you using lino runners because they help a lot if you’re using an etching type press. Once I hung some prints up by the tabs and the masking tape let the slip just a little bit and to took me a while to realise why everything was wrong. Live n learn.