We had the best time at the first official class at Spacecraft. First of all, it was sold out, which was a fantastic way to kick things off and also meant there was a great group of women to hang out with.
The talented Kristen Solecki taught the course and it was really neat to hang out with her and see what she does. I was surprised at how much I liked printmaking. It may become a new hobby!
So here’s a quick rundown of how it worked:
- You can either trace an image you like or draw something. I chose to do a flower and sun to start with.
- Transfer it to the linoleum using the tried-and-true graphite pencil method – you color on the back of the paper, then place it on the surface you’re transferring it to, and trace your image. It will leave a faint outline that you can use as a guide. The number of times I did this in art school….!
- Once you’ve done that, it’s carving time! This was incredibly therapeutic. I was surprised how much I liked it. The material was soft so it wasn’t hard at all, and you just sort of etched away at it until you got something you liked.
- There was a little more planning than I’d anticipated. There is a whole other element of the design process in that you need to decide what you’re printing in a positive or negative. To explain: everything you carve out will be white (negative) while whatever you leave will be inked (positive). Decisions, decisions!
Time to mix paint.
I had to of course make my own color (because who can resist playing in paint?) but it ended up that our table seemed to all like a pretty teal. After the paint was mixed, you laid it on to your linoleum with a brayer, pressed it on the paper, et voila!
Another bonus: you can carve the front and the back. So the above is my second design that I just carved right into the block and didn’t really plan. I ended up really liking its simplicity though.
At the end of the night, we all swapped cards so everyone went home with a set of 9 unique + beautiful prints from each member of the class. A special shoutout to Kelly Thiel & Liv of Terra Locale who were our crafting buddies of the evening – it’s so nice to run into familiar faces. I love that the craft community here is so supportive and growing!
It was a fantastic evening and I am anxiously looking forward to more time spent at Spacecraft!
