A Box for Bird Hide and Stickers for Pigs

Things have been really busy this spring with the very good bookbinding course at City Lit and general print experiments based around ancient grains and their production and more pig progress. One of the projects I worked on at the bookbinding course was a box to contain the little “Bird Hide” book I made a couple of years ago. See here https://pencilandleaf.blogspot.com/2017/02/bird-hide.html

I wanted to try making a box to hold a book, so I printed some calico for the bookcloth and some Japanese  paper for the interior covering material.It’s not exactly difficult, it just relies on very accurate measuring and a methodical approach, building a tray, the box top and the inset, then preparing the base and side and front cover with an extra inset for the inside of the cover and then assembling it all.. and just hoping it fits. It did! Hurahh!

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The structure of the box inside.

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The front cover with the printed bookcloth and the box structure.

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The finished box interior. The book fits into the aperture and under the book is a map of the walk which relates to the concertina book. Opposite is a short piece of text about the book and the path.

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There is an extra element. If you lift the map there is a tiny nest with three eggs. It’s all about birds, hiding, the woods and the path to the bird hide by the lake. I was so pleased that it worked! It has made something special of the small book.

And then pigs.. you can never have too many pigs. We are slowly getting round to the packaging of the Salute the Pig prints and the book. There have to be stickers!

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More soon…..

Almost done: The Problem Woodblock

It was all going so well .. so well. I came back from Amsterdam and with a bit of faffing about with shimming and extra packing, printed 11 of the large Tree woodcuts.

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“Alder” one of my favuorites,  with the charcoal burners and rooks.

Then the last one just would not print.

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There is a low strip in the wood and sod’s law it is on a part of the block which really needs to print a nice even black.
All  day Friday and again on Monday I tried everything;  shims, extra strips on the back under the low spot, raising the grain with steam and sanding down the high spots but still it refuses to print.

By lunch time on Monday I knew this was doomed so the only remedy was to cut another block.  Resigned,  I came home and promptly feel ill with an awful cold and I thought I had come through the winter pretty well! Wednesday, still with my awful cold  but cheered by the arrival of frogs in the pond, I re-cut the block. What a pain. But as with all these setbacks there is something to learn.

The dip in the wood was impossible to discern in its raw state but in future before starting I will run a block and sandpaper over the surface of the wood to flag up any serious flaws. To be fair this is cheap plywood and its done pretty well so far.

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Eventually on Friday, still with the awful cold, I finally managed to print the last block.

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“Willow”… at last.

Printing these blocks on the Western Press has been interesting and quite a challenge. They are big plates so need lots of ink.  I have double inked most of them and re-inked the rollers after every 2 or 3 prints. The tricky thing has been keeping the printing more or less consistent over the series; not too dark and not too light. It’s a balance of inking and pressure.

Some blocks are slightly higher than others and need less packing, some need lots of packing and more re-inking. Each plate must be proofed individually. It’s a slow and painstaking business.

I decided early on that I would let the grain of the blocks show. It gives an added texture to the prints and of course, as they are about trees it is much more appropriate than slapping on a heavy black and obliterating all the fine grain texture.
I am hoping to make 20 books. 10 with these plates printed on the Western and 10 with images I print at home. I am hoping to add another colour to some. But the next step is the binding.

The Branch Book

One characteristic of the big old oaks in the Spinney are the long long twisting branches that seem to defy gravity. Last year in December I needed to make some quick prints to make a small book to bind as part of a great 2 day course with bookbinder Ina Baumeister. On the course we were making a simple book but more importantly making our own bookcloth which was a complete eye opener.

For the book I made a very quick set of 8 sequential collagraph plates based on a long branch, printed to make a ten page codex book. (Good practise to get pagination right). This is the result.

branch-1-c     branch-1-bth

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Branch Book 200 x 130mm, approx 8 x 5 inches

I have returned to this to develop it more, to get more practise with both printing and binding. One of my aims this year is to get more books made and although it’s a slow process it is very satisfying… when it goes right. Today I printed 3 more sets on different papers to compare how they print, some thin, some thick…and hope to bind them slightly differently

branch-codex-book-pages    branch-plates

Yes, it’s very slow, it took me all day to print them but another good resolution this year is to try and do things properly, ie: take time to cut the paper correctly, make printing guides and TRY to keep my grubby fingers off the paper. This I managed, just, but only after quite a few reprints. Of course if I had made the plates all the same size exactly in the first place it would have helped!
It’s a learning thing…

After Amsterdam….

Three great weeks in August, some serious letterpress printing, lino cutting, cycling, fabulous museums and galleries, good food, drink and company.. and plans to return for even longer next year.
I will be putting some post s up about my time there, which if you are not a letterpress fan may look a bit dry. But my aim was to lean more about the capabilities, restrictions and potential for future projects.
I achieved all that and more thanks to the very excellent Thomas Gravemaker at LetterpressAmsterdam and the Vandercook.
More projects planned….. : )

And Another Hortus Book
Before starting the project with Thomas, there was by chance a short three day “Make a Book” course. ie cut linos, make etching plates, print them; hand set type,print it; bind book. Sounds fairly simple but is a huge amount to do in 3 days in a class. The course was run by Thomas, Carola Rombouts and Thekla Ahrens.
It was excellent. As I was in Amsterdam to print part of my Masters project it seemed appropriate to keep the theme going.
Just time for 5 of the 7 Janus herbs this time …
Simple imagery, typesetting and just 2 colours.

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Proofs, wood and metal type, lino and stamps. And the finished book.

   

Covers …

   

Double spreads..

Simple, with super fast lino cutting, but many more techniques understood and learnt…Great ! More Amsterdam printy stuff soon. Just a couple of weeks to go and the course is up!

And yet more trials…

There has been little time for practical work this week except a few more trials with mostly collagraph plates and combining some scrap prints with different plates to see what happens.

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Printing lightly on thin paper gives a lovely soft grainy effect and subtle overlapping colour mixes.

blue-4    blues-det

And a combined lino, collagraph and a bit of chine-colle

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Some accidents can really help, especially when, what you are actually trying to do, isn’t working. (often)
It’s always worth looking at some tiny details which could be enlarged and developed into new prints.

berries-2     berries-1

It’s also quite useful to have scrap prints to use for something else, a trial book jacket perhaps..
Ah yes ! And here is one I made earlier, out of scraps…There is nothing in it yet, it’s just a sort of book in waiting and will probably remain so..

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Spring though is definitely springing here…many bees, many birds and much frogspawn, lovely! I am having a few days off to dig the garden. Back after Easter.

More print trials. Collagraphs this time..Hmmm

This week has been taken up with more print trials and thoughts about my cast of characters as well as some thesis reading.

I have only made a few proper intaglio printed collagraphs before, usually preferring to print card plates as relief prints. But there is much to love about the intaglio method especially in the hands of someone as outstanding as Katherine Jones. I attended her workshop this weekend which was a fascinating insight into her working methods.
Courses given by master printers are both inspirational and frustrating, because they make it all seem so simple.
It isn’t…it so SO isn’t! However the trials I made will be very useful and I am beginning to understand how I can combine printing methods to created the images and effects I want. There is much to learn. These are some trials from the weekend.

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Fish are always a nice design-y subject to play with. These fish actually do have a special significance for the project.

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Two inkings of the same plate. This time a larger A3 plate.

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You can achieve some very beautiful, if accidental, effects.

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At the moment, every time I lift the paper away from the plate to reveal a print, it’s a complete surprise. If anything lovely happens it is purely accidental. Hopefully that will change and I will have a little more control. I carried on playing when I returned home and tried to make some systematic comparison plates using slightly different methods and materials Home trials with different inking

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Trials with different plates to compare marks and inking and surface.

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But it’s messy! I am not yet sure about collagraphs. They are thirsty for ink, laborious to ink up, and very very messy. Or I should say I am very messy, despite gloves. Me, my clothes, the paper, the press and the house are all covered in ink.

The Characters
Then I am also beginning to think about the characters. They include 17th century explorers, botanists, gardeners, herbalists, doctors and apothecaries. The process you choose to use can really change how you approach the imagery. I am playing with ideas, with methods, scale and imagery to find out what might suit. In arty terms its called “visual language”!… Trialling a simple bold lino print of a face.No one in particular ..just a trial.

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2 figure sketches and accompanying linos as yet unprinted.

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They will hopefully appear in some guise next week….

I’m glad it’s Leap Year

The extra day is much needed. This week’s progress has been mixed, a frustrating letterpress session, some quite interesting research for the thesis and some trial seed drawings and prints to be made into small trial books.It is all rather small at the moment. Playing with shapes and colours and a few concertina book ideas.

arti     seeds-conc     foxglove

 

art     c3      c4

 

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Below left are the first proofs of the little linos for the seed book. It will be a very slim volume, only 10 pages, but just enough to create a book block or two, printing will be a mixture of hand printed lino, InDesign  printed text and them maybe some letterpress.

My biggest triumph is getting everything set up to print a small booklet. Below right are some of the finished pages. Text printed first on my very cheap Inkjet via InDesign then the linos hand printed.

seed-linos      linos

The letterpress didn’t work that well as we only use the proofing press for trials. Paper, pressure, inking etc all have such an effect and it’s hard to get good results to start with, but I am getting quicker at setting up the type.
Below some big numbers, a small amount of set text and inkjet printing

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I am managing to keep my lino printing clean now but not so the letterpress work. Everything seems to get smudged.Its mainly because I am unsure about exactly what I am doing and faff about a bit. Letterpress seems to respond best to firm and decisive actions and deft movements. It will all improve, I am sure ..:)

More Print Trials, More Plant Notes

Another week of research, print trials etc. Sometimes there is not much to show for the hours, in finished picture terms, but the print trials are very useful. Different papers different ink combinations etc.
These are a few small sections of the trials. I really like these little pieces, there are whole other worlds contained in them.

col3     col2     col1

col7     col5     col4

And more plant sketches… again not much to look at but a very very useful bit of visual note making.

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pl1      pl3      Untitled-7

Colour, shape, history, etc etc Its all very interesting.

More Joy Than I Can Imagine

That’s what the first Bumble Bee in the garden brings me.

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Busy Buff Tailed Queen

Add to that the creative brain exercises that that the course requires and the arrival of a heater for the freezing garage/print room making the realisation of those exercises more possible. And I am slowly getting more and more familiar with prints and their endless and fascinating variety.

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A few trial prints.

It’s all trees, grasshoppers and the surreal world of the garden.

More to come when something is more resolved. This term is rushing by.