How to focus a mind in turmoil……

Loving this project but my brain has been well over-stimulated and darting in multiple directions, even though nothing much has yet made it onto the blog.

First:
I drew some cheese.

Nice, but is this what I want for a linocut?  I’ve got the stylization that I’m looking for but still have a nagging doubt, so I stopped at this point while reconsidering.

Second:
Walked the dog, mulled over the layered corrugated cardboard, which is still pinned to my board, and the possibility of patterning and colour mixing – essentially building some layers and depth, like the cardboard, only I want mine to show through and create new colourways.

I mixed a range of swatches.

Then briefly thought about a composition with more than one glass.

Huh, not bad for a 3 second sketch as I walked past my ever-open visual diary, but do I still detect a slight leaning in the stems?

Leaning stems?  Maybe that’s the way to go.  It’s certainly the way my hand continually goes.

I abandoned my choice of glass from my post of 2nd May and went back to my 50 or so drawings of wine glasses.

Third:
Based on my most free-flowing design to date, I drew another (leaning) glass and put aside the cheese aspect.  Lino was cut and a proof print taken.

And, yes, I love the lean!

Fourth:
Some patterning.  Perhaps a hint of ‘wallpaper’?
I designed something geometric in contrast to the curves of the glass.  Lino was cut and a proof taken.  Lino was photocopied and masks cut.

Fifth:
Using my colour swatches as a guide, I started printing.

Yellow, overlaid with deep blue.  Oops, even though the blue was mixed with equal amounts of translucent medium it’s still drowned out the full strength yellow.  However, if you can actually see the resulting green from the mix, it’s a great colour.

Deep blue, overlaid with yellow.  Without cleaning the main plate I rolled yellow over the remaining blue ink, creating this vibrant green.  This was then printed over the initial geometric plate which was inked in blue.  Getting more interesting but a lot of ‘interference’ from the cut away sections of the base blue plate.

Deep blue, overlaid with yellow.  Becoming even more green.  Love the colour, slight misalignment (the bane of every multi-plate linocut when using an etching press), and the blue is too prominent.

Rubine red, overlaid with deep grey.  Lovely colour scheme.  Super happy with this final print.

I printed on several different types of paper and found some picked up the ink so well I was able to get a very solid outcome, while others gave a softer more speckled effect.  I like both.

In addition, my masks were just photocopied images where I cut out the shapes I wanted to print.  I got much smarter as I went and finally avoided unwanted interference with the background pattern.  However, each photocopy paper mask quickly became ink-logged and tiny amounts leaked through onto the print when the press pressure was applied.  On the final print you can see this slight faint red marking across the solid grey.  I don’t mind it at all.

Sixth:
And finally, a couple of plain prints with the thought that sometimes less is more.

And, you know what?  After all that, I like the very first black and white print best.  The grey with the deep red pattern isn’t bad either.