This was for my first relief print assignment in my Intro to Printmaking class. I chose to use the optional theme of “Goes on and on” pretty loosely.
This was a bit ambitious for my first time carving, but I believe I did pretty well! I enjoyed the carving process actually way more than the printing process.
I had trouble maneuvering the printing aspect. The gloves get hot on the inside very easily, and combining it with the intensive ink rolling it turns into a gross sweaty sensory overload. Not to mention I haven’t yet mastered not getting ink on my bare hands at any point in printing.
Critiques for this piece were mainly the salt and peppering in some areas of the print, which is an easy fix now that I’m a little better at rolling on ink. That and the clarity of line in certain areas like the arm connecting to the torso. I’m quite proud of this piece and would love to revisit it.
Serene Disruption -
This piece was for Works on Paper, and it was self directed (do whatever you want). So obviously I drew CREATURES.
I honestly had a lot of fun making the composition and less fun putting it into practice. I didn’t have the time or motivation to add any sort of tree foliage so I just decided to cut it out and make that look intended. If I could go back to it, I’d use a different medium like acrylic or watercolor.
The goal was to simply make a peaceful scene with a bunch of “monsters”, something that should be abnormal to the human eye but is perfectly usual to the characters in the piece itself. I also was thinking of a The Wild Robot esque moment where opposing forces come together for a night of safety.
My class loved this piece during critique, they didn’t really have much issue with it besides maybe the color being unnecessary since my strong suit is black, white and optical grey. They said they wanted to see more textures akin to the grooves of the trees, and that I should lean into Japanese printmaking styles more because it’s something I’m successful at.
