Last week we spent the evening gouging pieces of lino using the special tools based on a design of our own. I ran out of time to print it so this Tuesday it was time to get in there and ink it up, bang it under the flypress and see what comes out on the paper.
I tidied up the lino a little, removing a couple of tags that were flapping about and then thought that I’d try a little roughing it up with sandpaper on the part where the yellow lines were in the original photo. Laura saw me doing that and looked incredulous at me like it was never going to work.
Registration
We were then shown how to make a registration plate out of a larger piece of paper and draw around the lino and the paper where we wanted the print in relation to the printed paper. We used small offcuts of card to stack up two and tape them to the top left corner of where the lino should sit and then a stack of three pieces of card made up the corner for the paper to sit in. The extra piece of card helped the paper catch as it was already up over the two pieces.
Once I’d got my old work overalls on so I didn’t get Intaglio ink over my clothes I rolled out some red ink onto the glass top and got it ready and perfect. Then we were shown into the other room where Laura rolled out some Prussian Blue and suggested we try it with that.
First Print
The print came out ok so it was moved onto the airer to dry where it would take a week or so to completely dry. I flipped the Lino over and on the reverse side I’d cut in a Batman logo from the 1989 Movie so I inked that up with the prussian blue and did a repeat action getting out the image you can see beneath. Laura paid me a complement in that she was pleased to see that I’d placed the print in the top of the print leaving some space open.
Once happy with these two prints I figured that since I’d rolled out the Red I may as well squeeze in a red print before clearing up to go home. I took my lino into the main intaglio room and inked up the lino with the walkway sign. I carried it back through to the press room and then set it all up on the registration plate, folded the boards down, moved it under the press and pulled the handle a couple of times to ensure good transfer.
Red Print
I rolled it back out from under the press and took a look at the result, I was really pleased with how it had come out.
Laura was 100% correct too, the sandpaper marks were nowhere to be seen in the final image. I should definitely listen to her every time she imparts some of her wisdom on us all.
With these three prints under my belt for the night, I left them all on the airer and then went to engage the Turpentine Spirits (not a seance) to help me clean up the Red and Blue ink that we’d rolled out earlier. With inky hands it was time to use the Swarfega, taking me right back to when I was 16 years old in the Engineering training school.
With myself and workspace cleaned it was time to head off and call my brother to see how Dad was getting on, it being the Tuesday after he was taken in on the Monday night. I was cream crackered at this point as I’d been in the hospital until 2am the night before. My brother, Gaz, said that our Dad wasn’t making much sense tonight but this was the beginning of the downturn that would ultimately lead to his death on the Saturday as already described in the previous post. I shall remember these prints now as a part of the history of the events that took place that week.
Conclusion
If I do lino again I think that I’d spend a bit more time creating a design that would have more impact and possibly a geometric shape, like the roof of King’s Cross, or the Selfridges Blobs for example…
There is no print club next week (Week 9) as it is a strike by the UCU against the terms and conditions that they’re being offered. We’ll pick up the week after with some screen printing to be done on t-shirts if the time allows.
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