My Linocut Printmaking

I’ve been experimenting with making linocut prints.

Leaf design, emboss

I’m new to linocut so my first effort is rather simple. I markered out an owl face in black and white, then transferred the image to my lino plate. I practised cutting on a spare piece of lino to make sure I had the hang of it. There’s no fixing linocut mistakes!
The owl face came out okay, I experimented with inks, and saw more possibilities.

I made a pretty freehand leaf design on the fly, and I think that one is my favourite of the two.

Owl face, prints and plate

I do like that smaller linocuts are easy to handprint – you don’t need a press.

The embossing prints (no ink) I find are the most interesting. You absolutely need a press to make them. And it’s best to make the embossings first, before you get ANY ink on your plates, as it may be difficult to get bits of ink out of the nooks & crannies in the cut lino plate.

I’ll try linocut printing with a slightly larger plate next time.

At some point, I’ll see into printing onto fabric with lino, but I’ll need access to a press for that.
Hopefully, the printmaking studio will be accessible in September...

Owl face, emboss

Leaf design, mixed inks

Leaf design, mixed inks

Leaf design, mixed inks

Leaf design, mixed inks