Monotype prints

I spent last weekend practicing, learning to do monotype. Janet from THIS, THAT AND THE OTHER THING wanted to know a bit about the technique, so here is some explanation about it.

It is hard, nothing turns out the way you think, you have to be really careful about colors how you lay them on top of each other as they mix in the printing process. white is not recommended, and I leaned why as is blurs the colors. if you wish to have white you scrape it off with various plastic or soft tools so you so not scratch the metal plate or use turpentine.

I was not really happy with any of the prints I got. I will try to silence myself critique and show some of my attempts. sorry about the photos, I just took them quickly with my mobile.

Monotype, , a technique that generally yields only one good impression from each prepared plate. Monotypes are prized because of their unique textural qualities. They are made by drawing on glass or a plate of smooth metal or stone with a greasy substance such as printer’s ink or oil paint. You can use a brush or more often a roller (cylindrical tool for applying paint or ink.)you can see them in the pictures below.

After the artwork you wet the paper for, it has its own kind paper, of course, several minutes. Then you dry the excess off by placing it between newspapers. This is an art form of its self you cannot have too wet paper or you too much paint or it spreads/leaks of the sides of the art work.

You set the metal plate on the press printer , add the wet, paper on top. Next step is to add several layers of felt on top of the plate. However, the tradition of imprinting conveyed in the literature in the field is unambiguous here. When printed, the press has several blankets of different thicknesses and qualities. the basic practice is to stack the blankets so that the densest thin 1/16 remains lowest against the tile and the more porous come on top of 1/8 and 1/4. Combinations vary slightly depending on different techniques and printing papers.

You press it once or twice depending how much color you want to get on the paper.