Making Woodblock Prints by Merlyn Chesterman

Author:Merlyn Chesterman
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781847979049
Publisher: Crowood

Rumour about Frogs by Rod Nelson. At a glance, this print appears to have a ratio of about 60 per cent black to 40 per cent white.

Fern Fan by Helen Roddie. This print, with a black/white ratio of about 50/50, confounds the eye with its Escher-like quality.

THE SHAPE OF EACH MARK

The shape of each mark is a kind of ‘handwriting’ that is characteristic of the printmaker, and the artist’s hand is inherent in the quality of the print, and in its uniqueness. The artful hand makes for vigour and energy in the print. The converse isn’t necessarily true, but there are prints with good ideas that are spoiled or diminished by poor style of cutting. There are no rules for ‘what is good and what is bad’, but one guideline that can be borne in mind is that if the mark is obvious and obviously made by a particular tool, it can be like a cliché in the final image, and reads as a tool mark rather than art.

Great cutting often finds a way of escaping from the obvious. A high level of accuracy and control with a tool can be achieved in such a masterly way that a sort of effortless beauty results. Very pedantic, highly accurate but overcontrolled cutting can result from an artist’s decision to make a very detailed drawing on the block before cutting it. This is a pitfall for any artist who is good with a pen and pencil, because such highly precise woodcuts, accurate though they may be, can fail to come to life as prints.

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