Monoprinting experiments

This weekend Jeff and I were trying out some monoprinting techniques. I was using a photo of Andrew Bird from Flickr for reference, making a pencil sketch of that photo to work from.


This was the sketch I made for reference.


My first attempt was done using raw umber oil paint. Not bad for a first try - I was able to get some interesting textures from wiping the oil paint with a paper towel after I mixed it with some turpenoid.


For my second print I used oil based printing ink. Like the first one, there are some parts of it I like, but overall it's more of a learning piece. I think the printing ink is better used for block printing because a lot of the details that were painted on the glass didn't transfer that well. Even though the ink was oil based, it still dried too fast.


I went back to using oil paint for the third print, but I think I used too much turpenoid because it came out much lighter than I wanted. I do like the splatters and the areas where the paint and turps bled.

I definitely want to play around with this process more until I can get it to a point where I feel like I can control the outcome of the prints better. I really like the texture that the transfer process brings out. Once these prints are drier I'm planning to scan them and try combining the prints with some digital painting. These are just photos of the prints. They were all done on 11" x 14" paper.