I’ve been having so much fun with the linocut prints that I pitched the idea as a family Thanksgiving activity. We all spent the afternoon listening to music, nibbling on appetizers and taking occasional breaks to carve our blocks and pull prints. I did this quick study of pears intended for a holiday card. The idea has promise, but I’m not really sold on the bits of light creeping around the right side of the middle and right pears. Next time I will do a gouache study before carving the block.

Printing notes: the proof below is actually on newsprint which performed better than the Daniel Smith Lennox paper. I went back and looked at my pumpkin print on Lennox and found that it suffered from the same problems I encountered with the pear – the ink sits high on the surface and it flows around, obscurring fine detail.

Pear Ensemble, Linocut Print, 4″ x 5″

Today I experimented with papers designed specially for block printing and had much better success.

Better paper makes a world of difference.

I used Dick Blick water soluble printing ink on five different papers. Here are the results:

1. Masa Paper – excellent transfer, good detail, inexpensive
2. Hosho Paper – good transfer, but very delicate – the ink began to soak through and I had to stop rubbing because the paper was disintegrating
3. Canson Edition Bright White – good transfer, but ink sits on top of paper instead of soaking in.
4. Rising Stonehenge – poor ink transfer, but I printed on the smooth side so I need to test again on the rough side.
5. Daniel Smith Lennox – good transfer, but ink sits on top of paper instead of soaking in.

Overall, it seems that thinner papers with a nappy surface work the best.

Five prints on five different papers.

The pumpkin notans were so successful I decided to reproduce them as linoleum block prints. I haven’t done this sort of a project since elementary school, but the block cutting went well. I pulled two test prints by hand using a baren and was pretty happy with the block, but still need to sort out the ink and paper combination so that I get solid blacks. My first print showed good detail, but the ink transfer was poor. I used a lot more ink on the second print and this helped the blacks, but I lost a bit of detail.  Both prints were made with Dick Blick water soluble printing ink on Strathmore 300 Bristol Vellum. I’ve heard that oil based inks work better on cotton fiber papers, and that water soluble inks are better on Japanese rice papers. I also suspect that a thinner paper would take the ink better than the Bristol.