Silkscreening

In our class on Wednesday night, we worked on silkscreening for the first time. I think it's a process that is draws a lot of printmakers. It's pretty versatile, you can work in many different sizes, and there's a lot of freedom about what kind off images you use, since preparing the screens (especially using a photo-emulsion method) is pretty easy. Hence, the images can be more complex than some other methods of printmaking.

I worked on an image of Norman Bates from Psycho, and I have a couple other screens made, one of my own photo (the one with the light and the chair which I posted in my last blog) and one of Martha Graham. I haven't printed these last two images yet, though. I'm planning to go pick up the images of good ol' Norman today, which I'll post before I leave for Thanksgiving.

In all honesty, I did not totally love silkscreening. For one, our teacher pre-prepared all the screens so they were ready to be developed with our images, so we missed out on a big step of the process and I don't really know how to recreate it. Second, the screens are pretty unwieldy, and it's a pain to print and image, wash the screen, dry the screen, print an image. Third, I seen to have a deficient skill for dragging the squeegee. I'm sure it takes practice, and I know that there are likely some really awesome uses for silkscreening, but I really appreciate the methods of printmaking and lend themselves to making multiple prints pretty quickly for practice.

I plan on going into the studio today or tomorrow, and will do some further experimenting, and print my other two screens. Who knows...maybe I'll end up loving silkscreening,. For now, though...eh.