Sunday, 18 December 2022

Quelab Print Party

We had a spontaneous printmaking party during the Quelab Open Hack on December 14, 2022.  

And Robert Atkinson created a print masterpiece by simply drawing on a Styrofoam plate with a ball point pen:


Ready for framing!


Robert Atkinson printing at Quelab


This would not have happened without the inspiration of Allie and Adam, who have been very busy creating a lot of projects recently at Quelab:

Allie printmaking and inspiring us


Adam printed
"the Grinch that saved Christmas"


First Adam had laser engraved the Grinch on linoleum
using the laser cutter at Quelab


Adam printing with a Print Frog glass baren,


The Grinch printed on typing paper


STYROFOAM PLATES
Instant Karma!

Printmaking with Styrofoam plates delivered INSTANT KARMA...aka a "quick turnaround" (but not so quickt that we went back in time).

We raided the kitchen and cut up Styrofoam plates to print with.  The artists drew onto the plate with a ball point pen -- with enough pressure to gouge the Styrofoam. They could then see the drawing he is going to print -- but in the inverse, as the gouged lines will be white as they won't print in relief printmaking:

Cutting up Styrofoam plates 
for quick-and-easy printmaking


The Styrofoam worked a lot better than I anticipated.  Moreover it was both quick-and-easy to create and print:

Halley visited during Quelab Hack Night
and walked away with her 
Styrofoam print masterpiece









My quick sketch in the Styrofoam plate
turning into a print


Adric showing off his 
masterpiece print of a single dice


Adric's dice gouged drawing
on a Styrofoam plate

AI distraction:
Midjourney prompt: "a linocut print of a dice"
Adric's dice
reimagined with AI in Midjourney,
ready to be engraved on the lasercutter
and printed once again



Rebecca showing off her 
Styrofoam relief print masterpiece


Inking with black water-soluble block printing ink
by Speedball


Printing by hand


Expanded PVC Foam plates

Earlier that week I had bought a sheet of Expanded PVC Foam at Port Plastics, and had it cut into 6x6 inch squares for printmaking.  The idea was also to "draw and gouge" into the expanded foam with a ball point pen, although this PVC foam was more difficult to gouge into than the Styrofoam.  We also had made prints the previous night, from the figure drawings on expanded PVC foam:


Brian with his print masterpiece


Brian pushed really hard with a ball point pen
to gouge the expanded PVC foam plate


Inking and printing


Brian's print came out very nicely, 
perhaps because of the contrast between the uneven ink
and rigid lines


Allie also made this print
starting with a ball point pen on expanded PVC foam

I brought in a figure drawing
I previously made on expanded PVC foam

The results of my prints were not pretty


 Gettin' Jiggy with It

Then we got bold and started experimenting, pushing the print, and Gettin' Jiggy with It:

The Jiggy Master Instigator himself,
Adam decided to add red mica pigment
to the black block printing ink


Mixing red mica pigment
with black water-soluble block printing ink


The linocut that Adam had
previously prepared on the laser cutter


While the final print did not look red,
it did seem to have an extra zing
that I attribute to the doping with red mica pigment


Rebecca sewed a design into a leathery pie shape piece of fabric, and inked it up.  I believe this process is more kin to "Collagraphy," for the low relief (example):







The Ghost Print had more definition
but not really satisfying


I think that Rebecca's print would have been more successful using an intaglio printmaking process; perhaps on the Sizzix embossing press in the sewing room, using etching ink.

***

Adam created this Christmas tree print
by drawing into Styrofoam


Allie wrote backwards into Styrofoam
so that the words would print and read correctly


Taking it One Step(s) FURTHER

imagined in Midjourney

The quick-and-easy Styrofoam prints can serve as a spring board to make bigger and better things.  The artist might key from them to make more sophisticated prints.  Or we could scan in the designs, refine them, and cut them out in metal on the plasma cutter, or into large sheets of wood on the big CNC machine, both at Quelab.

We can print onto t-shirts with fabric ink, using the hacked Skateboard Press (which was Hecho en Quélab), and making linocuts with the hand held LaserPecker2:



For example, previously Allie had poured resin over various objects, elevating everything into something entirely different.  One could also pour resin over our block prints as well.


Perhaps we can also transfer and bake prints onto ceramics somehow...

Maybe we can even make holograms from the Styrofoam prints.


Printmaking mess


Again, this relief print workshop unfolded rather spontaneously.  Once people saw what was happening, and easily figured out how to do it, they jumped in.  It's always hard to get that spark going, but with the energy building during Hack Nights at Quelab, that momentum was enough.  In particular it was the maker energy that Adam and Allie were bringing weekly to the antediluvian hackerspace; but also what Daniel, Sherrie and Robert were bringing as well, not to mention Bob, Ray and Aaron (I'm surely leaving a few others as well).

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