A little while ago, (yikes nearly three years actually!) I wrote this post about my travails with the reduction method of lino printing in two or more colours. As an alternative I developed a way of cutting and registering multiple blocks that worked with my little nipping press and I was reasonably happy with the results on Giant's Causeway and Artichokes, amongst others. This way the lino cuts for each colour are maintained intact as opposed the reduction method where the single plate is gradually destroyed.
However although my registration (getting the different colour blocks to match in the right place) improved with each new piece it became clear that what I couldn't do was cut the same line in exactly the same way twice, let alone three of four times. So I have wandered back into the realms of reduction and actually this time around its not so bad. I am now a lot more familiar with the inks I use, the properties of the different papers that I like and how to get the best from press so more prints make it to the final edition.
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| Detail from Mussels and Barnacles - a 3 colour reduction lino print - the barnacles were cut out before the 1st colour was printed so as to be left white as the pale, mid and then dark blue layers were added in turn - I could never have cut each and every barnacle in the same way on 3 separate plates. |
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| Mussels and Barnacles - Highlights and barnacles cut away - remainder printed in pale blue |
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| Mussels and Barnacles - Pale blue and mid blue printed |
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| Mussels and Barnacle - complete! |
Mussels and Barnacles is availabe in my Folksy shop and in my Etsy shop
