Printing with Intaglio
Although my emphasis for undergrad is ceramics, I am very excited about printmaking this semester, and in the past year I have developed a greater interest and enjoyment for this type of art. So far I have taken lithography, intaglio, and I am currently in screen printing. After having so much difficulty in lithography, I’m not sure what made me choose to take an intaglio course. I think it was mainly because I needed more art electives and I wanted more of a challenge. Another plus was having a great printmaker as a teacher! I love printmaking because after working on your matrix, you can duplicate your design as many times as you want. I also like how the different types of printmaking can create such a variety of results and such different looks and aesthetics.
I’m in screen printing right now, but I have chosen to do some intaglio pieces for my upcoming exhibition in December. My show is going to have a lot of nature imagery and family recipes, traditions, and memories. One of my ideas is to have a couple different prints showing family recipes that are important to my everyday life. The current theme for the project in my screen printing class is absence/presence. My idea is to make prints of my mom’s hot sauce recipe as it is an essential item in my family’s household. My best friend Ryan was also obsessed with this hot sauce. He passed away last year, so it feels important to include it because it reminds me of these fond memories of him coming over and stealing jars every now and then. Although there is the absence of my mom in my house now (since I don’t live with her), and the absence of a close friend, I can still re-create these memories through cooking and sharing recipes that are important to these relationships.
One of my favorite art eras for print and design is the art nouveau movement. I love the intricate designs and patterns in this time, especially the decorative borders. I made a print with a border inspired by this movement last semester and I wanted to do something similar, but with more detail this time. My plan is to print an intaglio plate with my art deco type border on all my paper. Then, I am going to screenprint different recipes on these prints using different screen printing techniques. Right now we are working with drawing fluid and screen filler on our screens. For this print, I am planning on replicating my mom’s handwriting with the drawing fluid to put the recipe on top of the border. My goal is to challenge myself by experimenting with different types of printing.
There are many steps that go into intaglio printing. The condensed version is this: Cut your copper plate to size, file, scrape and burnish the edges of the plate, spray paint the back of the plate (so it doesn’t etch), cover the plate with hard ground and heat set, use a twisted scribe to carve your design into the copper, etch the plate in a bath of ferric chloride, remove the hard ground, and print. As of right now, I am at the beginning of the process. I have drawn my art nouveau style border design on my copper plate and completed the etching process. I removed the ground on my plate and I am now ready to print! Stay tuned for printing results coming soon…