I don’t know about any of you but I seem to find myself
going through cycles of obsessions, where I’ll practice a particular technique
over and over and in different ways until something new catches my eye. This time,
however, I’ve been doing several new things at once and I guess you could put
them all under the term ‘embellishments’. The first of the new obsessions, (although
none of them are really new, just rediscovered) is printing; more specifically,
lino cutting. My father taught me to lino cut many, many years ago, and until
recently I hadn’t thought much more about it. That was until I considered printing
my own fabric to get a more unique product.
I started off with a basic lino cutting kit like this one,
just a couple of handles with some interchangeable blades, (until my dad very
kindly sent me a Japanese set, which are ridiculously sharp. I can tell you this
from experience as I seem to have one cutting accident each time I do I new
lino cut, unfortunate but luckily , not serious) and some soft cut lino. It’s important
if you’re starting out lino cutting to use the soft cut lino, not just any old
kitchen lino, because, as the name suggests, it’s softer and therefore easier
to cut. You can buy this type of lino from most good art shops. From there, it’s
just a matter of drawing your design, reversing it, and transferring it to your
lino; which can be done easily with tracing paper, and then using your tools to
cut away the excess lino so your design can be printed! It’s a delightfully
simple technique with lovely results. If you want to know more about lino cutting and printing, this site is really good!
Here are a few of my designs:
No comments:
Post a Comment