The printing Process

 I think now is a good time to give an overview on how it is I print these. I also think it's quite important as it is extraordinarily different from any kind of western printmaking I have ever tried, of which I have really extensively tried a few (Screen, Collagraph, Lino and Etching). This I guess comes closest to lno but is still worlds apart in reality.

These are the brushes I use, I use them to apply the pigments to the board. This is obviously the first difference from western printing as most normally a brayer is used here (sometimes called a roller). This wouldn't work here, as the pigments are essentially a liquid, being water based, so the rubberised surface of a brayer would repel the pigment and essentially be useless. the brushes hold ink in the bristles and so careful attention has to be paid to how much pigment is being added to the brush with every press so as not to differ from the previous print. Depending on the surface area of the relief section to be printed with every colour, I found that with smaller sections it was better to add the pigment with my mixing brush straight to the application brush and with a larger area I found it easier just to add the pigment directly to the board with the mixing brush to then be massaged in with the application brush. 

Here are the baseline materials used in this style of printing. In the green tube is the substance I mentioned in a previous entry, rice paste or 'nori' in Japanese. Before sitting down and really experimenting at length with this print style I was fairly unclear on what this was really for, only knowing it was supposedly necessary. I discovered why it is necessary immediately after printing the test print. It is, without a doubt, the single most versatile and important substance I have ever used in any form of printing second only to maybe the 'Baren', seen below it. Rice paste must be applied to the block before pritning begins with water in order to prime the block, this simple substance substance (just boiled down rice I believe) spreads the moisture of the water evenly throughout the block, ensuring that no area of your woodblock is damper than the rest of it, which when working with such lightweight papers could be catastrophic to an edition. On top of that, it is then applied to the block alongside pigment with every press as the pigment mixes tend to be to thin when used on their own (this is why the colours did not pop on my previous efforts, not enough paste and the colours dry extremely pale as watercolour does.), so add 'nori' and the pigment becomes more paste like itself giving vibrancy to your tones. Finally, its last main use that I have been able to devise so far but by no means its last overall, is that it can be used as a barrier between colour and moisture. When a fade is wnted I dampen with a wet cloth the side of the relief area I want to create a fade in add pigment to the other side and 'nori' in between, then, when I brush the pigment in, it remains bold where I put colour on the block and dilutes somewhat as the brush passes over the moistened area, the paste acts as a blocker and stops the spread from continuing down through the entirety of the moistened section. This cretes the fades that are so beautiful in Ukiyo-e prints.

On the right of the rice paste is sumi ink, a carbon based ink used for calligraphy and the likes as well as traditional printing. Usually I would not have used sumi, instead I quite like using oil based inks like those used for etching as it means that the black layer then fully repels all succeeding layers of water based inks leaving the black as bold as when printed (which is helpful as I almost always start with the black), this did mean that I would have to travel in to Uni to print the black every time as I don't have the materials or the press at home to print this kind of ink and with everything going on this year, I didn't see any reason not to become fully sufficient in printing from home. The test print was the first print I decided this on with the 'Dysart' print having the black done in oil based. (I think that for future projects I may transfer back to oil based, as the colour is far more sharp at the end of printing, was just curious.)

again on the right of this, is camelia oil. the sole use of this is to rub against the surface of the 'Baren' so as not to damage the reverse side of the print as the baren abrasively rubs against the back of it to lift pigment of the block.

Below these three materials on the left, is the baren. This is most certainly the greatest tool in my arsenal. I wont explain it at length like the nori as there are western equivalents. This does differ slightly from those in the west though, as it is made of a coiled rope wrapped around a plastic cover and then, a dried bamboo leaf stretched over the rope and tied at the back. I have already had to recover one of these as the bamboo sheath that came with it, cracked on the first few uses and can tell anyone that wants to know, that job alone is almost as tricky as discovering how to print with it. I did film myself doing this but as the video ended up being 35 minutes long and the result far from perfect, I decided it wouldn't do anyone any good to sit and watch it.

On the right of these are of course tubed watercolours. I thoought it necessary to show these, as the 6 colors above are the only colours I used throughout the printing of all 'waka' prints. This is again because you have to start of with the 'correct' way, before moving on to my own way. These 6 colors are the traditional colour pallette of all Ukiyo-e prints, with every other colour achieved through the mixing of these 6. They are as follows:

Vermillion

Indigo

Prussian Blue

Karmin

Process Yellow

(Rust red is the best translation I could find so I chose..) Venetian Red

And that about does it for the base line materials, apart from I guess, the obvious one... Water.

Another photo of my baren from the other side, showing bamboo handle.

Here is the workbench I set up in my flat to print at. It's the second workspace I've made, the first had me sitting on floor and after finishing the 'Dysart' print, my back told me I needed a change. pretty basic really, an upturned laundry basket with the MDF board given to us at the start of first year laid across the top of it and a glass panel on the floor to my left and portfolio with dampened sheets inside to my right. (Still to much bending over in an ideal world but it does the trick.)

This glass panel, big as it is, was taken of an old set of garden furniture that was sitting in my parents garden unused, shortly before coming back down to Manchester, at the time wasn't sure there was much point but now know that it was a stroke of genius as I couldn't have worked without it. 

This is about as messy as I can let things get when it comes to a workspace but felt okay as I was just mixing inks for proofs at this stage, once I'm happy with the amount of paint needed for each pigment I mix enough for the edition in the small glass bowls also seen above.

This is more like it. The rice paste tube is still unnecessarily sat on top of the bench but all other elements present are necessary. diluted rice paste in clear glass bowl with undiluted sumi in bowl below, the brush sticking out from this bowl is used to apply the ink to the brush above the woodblock that then applies it to the block, a bit of greyboard cut out to protect registration marks from picking up ink, the camelia oil, baren and clean towel to rest baren on top of on the right and a desk lamp to light up my space.

Thats pretty much all I can explain with the photos I have. It is horrendously different to that of western printing so much so that it almost becomes akin to that of painting. I do think it is the nicest form of print I have ever practiced with, that can supply some of the most versatile results and has some of the strictest processes that suit my need for structure in work, very well. So, extremely happy to say that all of my previous printing efforts were not in vain...