First Masked Monoprints

I'm moving on to the next assignment of the OCA Introduction to Printmaking. I'm not sure where to go next with my first monoprints so will come back to them when I get some inspiration. The first image I created a mask from was a drawing of a river.

I created a collage of the image, I was interested in the curves of the river. I cut a mask of this and took a one and two colour print from it.

 This was not enormously successful, the stencil was too fragile as I had cut so much away. It was particularly difficult to attempt to line up the two colours. I used pencil marks to show where I thought the second mask should go but it was all too flexible. It was particularly hard to register the loose pieces of masks that do not touch the edges.

 For this mask I used some sketches of fish. I placed them diagonally to create energy which was effective. I'm not sure if using more ink would give a cleaner print.

In this image I added a second layer of a negative mask of pink fish. The color wasn't strong enough or I didn't use enough ink as it is not very clear. Maybe this could be a nice effect for a subtle layer. It is hard to get a balance between an image where the ink leaks out the edges from too much ink and one which doesn't transfer well. It would be interesting to see how this worked if the blue went over the pink.

In this image I used the negative mask from the first image. This is the second print from this. I used quite a lot of ink and the first print bled a lot around the edges. I much prefer this second image and the texture created.

In this print I have used two layers. Layer one is the ghost of the attempted layer of positive masked pink fish on the blue print above. This is one of many ghost prints I prefer to the first print. I then inked up a green plate and experimented with some simple back drawing leaf shapes inspired by Matisse collages.

This image is the ghost print of the green plate back drawing above. After I drew on the back of the paper to create some leaf like shapes and took the first print I put masks down to take this print and I like this texture. I will explore this further with more detailed back drawing.

This is the third take of this plate, I love these ghost images.
In these prints I have used very simple shapes, taken from simple sketches and my imagination. I love the textures I have created and am very excited by the beginning of exploring layering. I am going to develop this further by exploring some sea shapes in more detail and exploring Matisses Beasts of the Sea and other collages and stenciled works. I am pleased with the use of diagonal movement and the energy it creates and will explore this further.