Linoleum relief prints
Linoleum relief prints are made by carving away the areas that you do not want to print, rolling on the ink with a brayer, then printing through a press or by hand. I love to layer and register colors in solids and transparencies to produce my prints, although sometimes I keep it more simple with single or limited color. I use Flexcut and Powertool cutting tools and try to keep them sharp, and enjoy using oil based inks to achieve vibrant and nuanced colors.
mokuhanga wood block prints
Another kind of relief printmaking I love is Mokuhanga (Japanese) Wood block printing. Using wood blocks, I carve away the spaces I don’t want to print as in linoleum relief, but instead of rolling ink, I paint water based gouache directly onto the carved block. Each dampened sheet of paper is registered to the block and hand transferred by rubbing it down with a bamboo baren.
