Printmaking

MEDIA: LINO BLOCK, CARVING TOOLS, CARBON PAPER, PRINTMAKING INK, PAPER, TRACING PAPER.


 I was actually very fascinated with the printmaking assignment we did.  Out of all the different medias we interacted with this semester, I personally enjoyed working with the linoleum blocks and carving them out by using a speedball cutter.  This came as a new way to express our skills in art and everything about this assignment was new.  In terms of the design process, we are allowed to take our imagination to another level by creating an image of our own.  We did this by taking a few pieces of tracing paper and transferring certain parts of a chosen image in order to create a unique type of subject to work with when carving out linoleum blocks.  I had a hard time deciding what design to create so I took the longest time in the design process.  After finally finalizing my design, the transfer process was a work in the park.  With the help of the provided carbon paper, I was able to easily transfer my image on to the linoleum block with ease.  The process of doing so had to be treated with extra care.  Carbon paper in art can either work with you or against you depending on how careful you are.  Despite the easy process, I treated the transfer with caution by using tape to hold down the tracing and carbon paper as slowly and carefully trace my image onto the linoleum block in order to complete the transferring process.  When cutting the block, I expected it to be rough and hard.  Little did I know, the only difficult thing about the cutting process is getting through all the tight areas of my image and actually avoiding any cuts from the speedball cutter.  The other things I have to think about is what areas have to be carved out in order to create that image in the printmaking process.  I felt like making some sort of stamped image where I have to pay attention in terms of positive and negative spaces.  All areas that are not carved out will be the areas that will show up in the printing process.  The carved areas in the other hand are the ones that will help bring out the image because the ink does not go through those areas during the inking process.  Using the printing ink and a speedball roller, we are able to apply the ink on to the carved linoleum block by rolling the ink on the created image and transferring the inked block on a couple of printing papers.  This process was actually exciting but suspenseful at the same time.  This process to me shows if we carved in our image the right way onto the block.  Fortunately, my image didn’t look as bad as I expected.  First try didn’t come out the way I wanted to due to the lack of ink.  As I printed out more and more copies, I begin to modify my block by carving certain areas and managing my ink applications each time.  Practice makes perfect and modifications helped out a lot with this assignment.  Personally for me, the design process, like I said, was the most difficult because deciding what image to create took a little time.  With days of debating, a design was finally created. 

Relief Scuplture Mask and Mix Media

MEDIA: CLAY, MIX MEDIA (Feathers, Cotton)


When completing my mask or at least right after the heating process, I did not know how to go about with designing the mask in terms of even painting it. I started off with some black paint on the facial hair areas making them the color black. I later mixed colors to create a skin like color of dark brown to color the whole face. The image later popped out little by little as my mask slowly became an "Indian-like Bob Marley" face. I later took advantage and played around with reggae colors by showering my mask with the colors red,green and yellow. This last step of the relief mask sculpture served as the most exciting because of the spontaneous use of color and mix media. A few additional materials I chose included black cotton hair and feathers for a little flavor. By seeing how the outcome of the mask turned out, putting on hair and feathers as a mix media had to be must in order to complete the look of my relief mask sculpture. I figured that putting colorful feathers can really set the tone and bring out all the hard work I put through into creating this sculpture.

Working with Wet clay/Clay textures

 MEDIA: CLAY, TEXTURE UTENSILS

Modeling wet clay was a very new experience to me compared to modeling play dough clay which I'm sure all of us here has done when they were little kids.  Aside from the enjoyment I get from feeling the wet clay, I found it really slippery and hard to handle at times.  Building my oval-shaped slab took a while due to the process of shaping the slab in a certain way.  It is advised to start of with a ball of wet clay.  We were to work our way out little by little until we are able to form a face like structure.  To me, the quantity of clay served as a factor in making the oval like shaped face.  From my experience, having too much or too little can ruin the shape of the face in size.  Certain areas would be a little bulkier than other areas which us something I would try to avoid.  The best part about wet clay is that is is an additive a subtractive media.  I am able to remove clay from parts of the mask in order to balance out the shape.  Working with wet clay can be very fun but also can be a very messy type of media to work with as well.  With the wet clay, I am also able to work with different textures for practice.  I was a little spontaneous at this point because a just went crazy with the textures grabbing any tool I can find and making it work.  I had shells, rocks, blades, leaves and many other things to help compliment my mask.  I had blades running over my clay slabs, rocks being printed on the clay and leaves being placed for it's natural texture affect.  In terms of plan and design, knowing the possibilities I have let my imagination run loose on my mask.  Taking advantage of the additive and subtractive characteristics of the wet clay, I was able to cut out portions of the face to create the eyes and the eyebrows.  With doing that, I was able to distort the figure of the face by making it a different shape than usual.  I also took advantage of some household items and materials to help design and plan my mask.