Module 1, Chapter 2–Printing onto Coloured Papers

From my visual research of the new Library in Birmingham, I made a a print block from fun foam which I carefully cut with a scalpel – this enabled me to make relatively fine detail, and also to make a second block from the piece I’d cut so I had both a positive and negative of the motif.
Here I am hard at work looking rather serious, mounting the cut out foam blocks onto some thick card.








I used a roller to apply acrylic paint to the print blocks to give it a more even coat of paint. I had quite a session of it as you can see – I used a clothes airer to hand the papers to dry as I have limited table space, and this allowed me to keep printing while I had all the paints on the go.
When using a roller you tend to have loads of spare paint on it, so after I finished printing, rather than wash it all down the sink, I kept rolling onto any piece of paper I could get my hands on, using different angles, pressure and ends of the roller for different effect – Also into my sketch book pages – I basically rollered everything in my path and it’s a good job himself was out or he may have had a coating too!
I also kept the paper I had used underneath as I was sloshing and printing which had some pretty interesting marks by chance, and will I’m sure come in handy for some collage at a future date. Here’s an A4 section of this ‘drip sheet’ below.

Here are a couple of pages of my sketchbook (A5 opened out to A4). I used up the paint on my stamp and then added a wash of colour once it was dry (below right), and I used a paper star shape as a mask and roughly rollered over the top to use up the paint.

A happy accident – I the star I used as a mask (below) looks highly decorative in its own right – I used the roller after having dabbed my stamp direct to the pallette numerous time, and these imprints were transferred to the roller and on to the paper – you can just make out some ghostly marks form the print block.


Here are a selection of some of the more successful pieces

Assorted patterns on A4 Sheets using acrylic paint and procion dye washes

Module 1, Chapter2 - Making Coloured Papers

I chose the complimentary colour scheme of purples & yellows that was suggested by the image of Gaudi's La Sagrada Familia in Barcelona which I found as part of my visual research. Using procion dyes I coloured up a range of papers I had to hand including cartridge, tissue, thick brown & printer copy papers.



I only had a small sponge so as well as using this I applied the dyes with large brushes & scrunched up fabric. I let the pages get pretty wet so I could encourage the colours to run by lifting up the edge. This also enabled transfer of the wet dyes onto other papers which were pressed onto the wet sheets.



The above papers have been scanned with an A4 scanner - Clockwise from top left:

1. brown paper, creased – the colours look very different to when applied to white or cream papers.
2. cling film wrinkled over wet page – subtle textural marks
3. copy paper crunched up a few times before and inbetween applications of layers of dyes
4. tissue paper smoothed over wet page of cartridge paper to transfer colour
5. rock salt applied to wet page to form ‘halos’ – I’d used the salt previously which had absorbed some colour that then transferred to make colour dots
6. dripping of dye onto surface, tilting to encourage running.