In college (a long time ago!) I took a semester of silkscreen printing. I needed a refresher course so I signed up for a weekend screen print class through
Otis College of Art. Since the class was only a workshop, we used stencils to print from (instead of photo emulsion which gets really fine detail). I spent all week coming up with ideas and cutting my stencils.
The part that is cut out is the part that gets the ink. With linoleum blocks, the part that is left after carving is the part that prints whereas with silkscreen, it's the opposite so I had to change my way of thinking. I designed an image using 2 colors. We used contact paper for the stencil and here is what my first stencil looked like (the white part is the stencil and the green in the center will be a color).
The stripes in the half circle and the round dots in the middle were added separately on the screen.
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| Stencil cut with white contact paper |
After sticking the stencil on the screen and taping all around, I was ready to print. My first color was orange.
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| ink on the screen |
Next comes pulling the print. (Since I was printing and couldn't photograph it, I took a picture of classmates using a squeegee to pull the ink through the screen)
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| pulling a print |
How does it look? I took a peek as I peeled the paper from the screen. The blue taped helped me register the paper.
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| the first print |
Here is another look. Can you guess what it will be?
After cleaning the screen and taping the second stencil to the screen, I was ready for my second color. Since I was rushing to get done by the end of class, I neglected to take any pictures but here is the finished product. I was able to print 15 images on paper and do one tote bag.
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| Big & Little Owl Buddies |
