Three Color Reduction Monotype - Last Day

Monday was the last day of our Wingtip Press workshop with Rose Davies.  Rose will be giving a talk this Wednesday evening at Wingtip Press, 6:30 p.m., if anyone would like to attend.

The first few days of the workshop, my subject matter was representational images.  Amy asked me why I didn't do something like the more abstract stuff I do with fabric.  I had been thinking about that, noticing that when I am doing some kind of print, I mostly pick more realistic things. Why is that?

My thoughts are that the two mediums are so very different. So, my brain thinks about them differently. With the fabric, I can get a strong graphic line with a seam and have geometric shapes of color.  A linocut has a nice strong graphic line, but with this technique of monotype, you really have to work at getting a strong crisp line.  It lends itself better to more blending and softer lines.

However, Cassandra worked abstractly the first few days and inspired me to try something abstract on this last day.  (She did something representational on the last day.)  Below is one of her abstract prints.

I also did two prints instead of one.  Here is the yellow layer of one of them (it's upside down) and the other one was just all yellow.

Here is the first one with the red layer on top.  We used a little bit different ink this time and I think we were able to get more color on the first print.

Here is my second print with the red layer completed.

Then, we had a little tea break.  

Rose had made some Welsh cakes in the morning and brought them for us to try.  Very delicious.   

Afterward, it was back to work finishing up the blue layer.  Here is my second print completed.

Here is Cassandra's finished representational print.

I forgot to get a picture of my completed first print, but you can see it (along with the ghost prints) on the near end of the table in this picture where we have laid out most of the prints from the workshop.

When we had these laid out on the table, I noticed that my prints from the first two days had a similar palette of mostly greens and blues.  Whereas, the last day when I went abstract with the prints, the palette is mostly yellow and red (and very bright).  I think I would like to mess around with the stripes some more and the other abstract idea as well.

I'm really glad we had several days to work with this process.  As with most things, it helps to practice and it helped cement the concept into the brain.  I hope to do some more of this.