Kitchen Corner Series

I have one more linocut completed in the Kitchen Corner Series.  That is all I will be doing for right now.  I'm going to take a break from the press and get back to fabric.  I might revisited this series at a later date.

This fourth piece in the series is called Drink Me.  And I did some in black and brown ink again, since that was what I was doing for the rest of them.

Kitchen Corner Series

The Kitchen Corner print series started with the two prints I did for the Leftovers exchange.  I liked how the first two came out so I kept on going.  The third print in the series is called Mix it Up.  I also did black and brown ink on these, but I didn't care for the brown ones as much on this print.

Mix it Up

linocut

Image size 2-1/2" x 4"

Paper size 4-1/2" x 6"

©Lisa Flowers Ross

 $20

I think this one is o.k., but it is my least favorite of the group.  I think I cleared out too much of the linocut material.  I like the measuring cup and the eggs.  But the Kitchen Aid mixer stand seems not as timeless as the items in the other two prints.  The background wall has a regular pattern and is not as organic as the leaves out the windows of the first two prints.

On its own, the print is fine and I like it.  In the series, so far, it doesn't seem to fit in as well.  What do you think?  I have one more to share with you in another post.

Kitchen Corner

In the last post, I shared the linocut print I did for the Leftovers exchange.  Since I was so happy with that one, I decided to do another one.  It is the same size and I got it finished before the deadline as well.  Therefore, I have two sets of prints for the exchange and I will get two (different) sets in return.

And a series has been born.  I am calling these little linocuts the Kitchen Corner series.  This second print is also a varied edition as I did some in black and some in brown ink since that is what I did on the first.  Not really having planned to do another print, the brown inks don't match because I mixed each of them by hand.

Oops, I just noticed here that I was in such a hurry to get them in for the exchange that I forgot to put the E.V. next to the number of the print.  I'll put it on the ones I have remaining.  I have a few in the black and a few in the brown color and they are available for sale.

Ready

linocut

Image size: 2-1/2" x 4"

Paper size: 4-1/2" x 6"

©Lisa Flowers Ross

$20

Stayed tuned for more in the series!

Leftovers

Happy May Day!  It's hard to believe the month of May is already here.  April was a busy month with a few deadlines to meet, the biggest being taxes.  But a more pleasant deadline was that of the Leftovers V print exchange.

This is the fifth year that Wingtip Press has hosted this exchange of small prints (less than 5" x 7" in paper size).  The intent being to use up the leftover pieces of paper that printmakers often have after tearing the paper sheets down to size to create a print.

So far, I have participated in the exchange every year.  This year I wasn't sure I was going to make the deadline.  My first attempt at a reduction linocut print was a complete failure (which you may have read about here).

With the deadline creeping up on me, I decided to go back to basics, a simple linocut.  I carved a 2-1/2" x 4" block and got them printed up.   I decided to do some with black ink and some with a dark brown ink that I mixed up.

Here is the print in black.

At Home

Image size 2-1/2" x 4"

Paper size 4-1/2" x 6"

©Lisa Flowers Ross

From the writing on the bottom of the print, you can see that I made 28 prints in this edition.  E.V. stands for a "edition varied".  In this case, that means I did it in two different colors.

Here is the print in brown.

I thought it was hard to portray the transparency of the glass jars with the linocut.  But I am happy with the print.  I purposely left a lot of the chatter, especially around the trees because I wanted it to suggest a little bit of movement like a wind blowing the leaves.

I turned in 14 of the edition for the exchange and still have some available for sale.

I was so happy that this print turned out o.k. that I decided to do another one.  I will share that one in the next post.

Failure is an Option

It seems like, in general, most people (including myself) share our success stories on our blogs and in our social media realms.  This is fine and nice to let others share in our joy or to be an inspiration for somebody else.

But how often do we share our failures?  Why would we want to do that?  Failure in our society isn't seen as a positive thing.  But aren't we suppose to learn from our failures?  Then, how can we learn if we never fail?  What if someone else could learn something from our failures?

"I have not failed.  I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work." - Thomas Edison 

You have probably heard this quote before.  Edison must have learned a lot from so many attempts which eventually led to something that did work.

I am going to share one of my recent art failures with you today.  As most of you probably know, I have been getting into printmaking for the past several years (thanks to the local printmaking studio, Wingtip Press).  Wingtip hosts a print exchange every year (this is the fifth year) and I have participated every year.

This year I wanted to attempt a reduction linocut.  I have just done a few of these in the past.  You can see the one I did last year here. This time I wanted to do a four color reduction.  Starting with the lightest color, I printed yellow.

As you can see, there wasn't much I needed to carve out of the block.

Printmakers also call the reduction linocut the "suicide" print.  This is because you continue to carve out sections on the same block for each color.  If you mess up, you cannot go back and print more.

I started with about 26 prints hoping to get 14 that would turn out o.k.  Here are all the yellows printed.  So far, so good.

Then I carved some more and printed the second color, orange.  Already I had missed the registration of some of the second color as you can see by the middle one on the bottom row.

More carving and the third color was green.  

On one of these, I actually printed the plate in the wrong direction.  I guess I wasn't paying attention. The registration is also off on many.  At this point, I pretty much knew I wasn't going to get enough good prints, but continued on.

Finally, the last color was black.

They don't look too bad from afar.  But take a closer look.

Above you can see that the registration of the colors is off from the edges and the stems in the middle.  The extra lines on some of the leaves are what printmakers call "chatter" from the block. Often I don't mind the chatter, but I don't like it for this piece.

Out of 26 prints, I got zero that were acceptable to me.  A complete failure!  I was so bummed because the Leftovers deadline was looming and I now had nothing for it.  (I did manage to do another print for the deadline and will share that in another post.)

What I learned from making this print:

1)  Reduction linocuts are hard!  I already knew that but they get even harder with more colors.

2)  I need to figure out a better way to do the registration.

3)  Thin lines don't work very well with this technique.

4)  This design probably should have been in a different process altogether.  I'm thinking maybe as silkscreen print (or hey, how about fabric!).

5)  I think I liked this design better with just the three colors (yellow, orange, green) but couldn't just stop at that point as the design wouldn't have been complete.

6)  Practice, practice, practice will probably never make it perfect, but it will make it a lot better!

7)  I need to figure out a way to repurpose failed prints into new art (collage?) so I don't waste the paper.

And here is an artist that really knows how to do it - Stuart Brocklehurst.  He shows the progression of steps of the pieces he is working on, on his blog.  He prints his by hand (without a press).

Merry

Christmas is almost here.  I have been enjoying parties and activities, but haven't gotten much artwork done.  I did manage to create a reduction linocut card for people who purchased my artwork this year and a few friends.

I have written about the reduction linocut process here before.  It's a little scary to do because you don't know how many good prints you will get in the end.  So, you always start with more than the number you want.

I still feel like a novice when it comes to print making.  There is so much to learn.  I learned a few things from doing this card:
-  First, don't fold the paper before you print.  It's harder to print that way (duh!).
-  It's helpful to have all the ink colors when mixing ink.
-  Don't use Sharpie on the linoleum block.  It will print with the ink. (I knew this but had forgotten.)

My original drawing for this card had a color scheme of pink, red and burgundy.  When I pulled out my ink colors, I only had Red Oxide which doesn't make for a very Christmas-y red.  It was o.k. to make the pink, but after that I had to change my plan.

Here is the first color, pink.  I was just using some card stock I had on hand.  I liked the creamy, yellowish color but didn't have enough of that and had to use some white, too.  You can see that the pink looks slightly different on each of the background colors.

The dark outlines around some of the shapes is the Sharpie.  It might be an interesting effect to use on purpose some time.  Fortunately, in the end, you can't really tell.

I printed these by hand, which means I rubbed on the back of the paper with a barren.  I set up an area for printing on my drafting table.

On the right is a piece of glass that I mix and roll the ink on.  The other piece of glass is what I put the block on when I'm inking it.  On the left is the inked block ready to print and that knobby thing above it is the homemade barren that my friend made and gave to me.  It works very nicely.

I had to create something so that I could register the paper each time I did a new color.  Here is what I came up with.

I used a leftover piece of mat board and taped some smaller pieces of mat board strips to it.  This is to place the block in the same position every time.  On the left I had marks to line up my paper.  Since I had folded the paper first, I had to be more careful getting the paper to the block side.

After all the pink was printed, I carved away some more of the block and printed a light blue.

Then I added one last color to give it a little more depth.  I had some help from some friends in deciding what the last color would be.

Here are a bunch of the finished ones drying.  The last color was a dark bluish gray with some silver mixed in.

I hope your holidays are Merry!