This document provides an overview of different printmaking techniques including relief printing techniques like woodcut and linocut, intaglio techniques like etching and drypoint, stencil techniques like silkscreen, and planographic techniques like lithography. It describes the basic processes for each technique such as how the image is created on the plate or surface and how it is then printed to create multiples.

1. Printmaking
Techniques

2. Different types of printmaking
techniques
• Relief
• Intaglio
• Stencil
• Planographic
• Monotype

3. Relief Printmaking
• Produces a reversed image.
• A flat surface of wood or lino as a printing
surface.
• Parts of the design not to be printed are cut
away.
• The plate is inked up and transferred to the
paper.
• Direct pressure - the plate is in direct contact with
the paper.

4. Woodcut
• Relief
• The oldest technique used in fine art printmaking
• Leaving the raised image which is then inked
• Pressing the selected medium (usually paper)
onto the inked image.
• If colour is used, separate wood blocks are
required.
• Only low pressure is needed to make a print

5. Linocut
• Has been used to make matrices for relief printing since the first years of
this century.
• Finished print has a very similar aesthetic to woodcut.
• Easier to work with than wood as it has no knots and is flexible.
• This technique is not different from woodcut as the finished prints have
the same aspect, but linoleum is easier to work than wood, as there are
no knots and it is flexible, offering itself to fluid, spontaneous drawings.
• Kandinsky and some Expressionists engraved on linoleum. Matisse was
fascinated by its ease in working and used it in the simplest terms
possible, creating a series of engravings of pure white lines on a black
ground. Picasso too used linoleum to do a number of coloured linocuts
between 1958 and 1964.
• The evolution of linocuts is particularly interesting; it was developed in
Poland after the second world war, where Grabowski and Starczewski
analysed the structural elements of its graphic language.

6. Intaglio Printmaking
• Opposite process of relief printing.
• The image is drawn, cut or etched into the
surface.
• Print is created by printing the sunken area of the
plate, pushing ink into them and applying heavy
pressure to press the paper into the inked marks
• The marks that are made are those that directly
create the image.
• Usually printed on Roller press.

7. Etching
• Although it is commonly done in copper, steel, zinc and
aluminium are also used as they are cheaper.
• Acid resistant ground is applied to the plate evenly.
• Two types of ground: 1. Soft – Allows for a lot of textures to
be pressed into the plate 2. Hard – Better for creating sharp
lines.
• The design scratched on to the plate.
• The back of the plate is sealed.
• The plate is then put in an acid bath where the image will
be etched into the plate.
• The ground is cleaned off, and the plate is ready to be
printed.

8. Drypoint
• Similar to etching
• No use of chemicals
• The artist scratches directly onto the plate with a sharp
pointed tool.
• When scratching a burr is created.
• Velvety dark lines which are a characteristic.
• The plate is first inked and them wiped clean.
• The printing is done through an intaglio press.
• Because the burr is fragile and wears down quickly, the
plate can only be used a small amount of times.
• The edition size is usually very small, rarely more than 20 to
30 impressions.

9. Mezzotint
• Dating back to the 17th century.
• Considered one of the most difficult and time
consuming printmaking processes
• Reversed version; the artist works from black to white
instead of white to black.
• Begins with a heavy textured surface created using a
tool called a rocker.
• To develop an image the artist starts smoothening the
texture with a scraper or burnisher, making areas hold
less ink.
• This produces a range of soft, subtle gradations of tone
without the sharp lines of an etching.

10. Aquatint
• Enables the artist to create a graduation of tone from
white to black.
• This is used by artists who desire more tonal variations
in their print.
• A thin layer of powered resin particles is dusted onto
the surface of a plate.
• The plate is heated, which makes the dust melt and
become acid resistant.
• When the plate is placed in the acid bath, the acid
etches the areas around the dust particles and various
tones are created.

11. Silk Screen
• This produces a direct image.
• Different layers of colours are printed by
making different stencils.
• Areas of the screen can be blocked off and not
be printed.

12. Planographic Printmaking
• The printing and non printing area are on the
same level.
• The image is drawn on litho stone or a metal
plate.
• The Image can be printed both positive and
reversed, depending on which press are used.

13. Litography
• Invented in 1796 in Germany.
• Based on the property that water and oil does not mix and is therefore creating
both image and non-image producing areas.
• The images are drawn or painted with water-repellent materials directly onto a
polished piece of limestone.
• The stone must then be chemically treated to prepare the image for printing.
• This solution causes the areas covered by the image to attract ink while the
unmarked areas to repel it.
• The entire stone or metal plate is then moistened with water which is absorbed by
the unmarked areas and repelled wherever there is grease.
• Oil based ink is then rolled onto the surface of the plate. The ink adheres to the
greasy areas, but repelled by the wet parts of the stone or plate.
• The stone is run through the press and the ink is transferred onto the paper and
producing a duplicate of the original painting or drawing.
• For multi coloured prints, a separate stone or plate must be used for each colour.

14. Monoprint
• Only one impression
• Cannot be editioned
• Applying ink to a flat surface and transferring
it to paper.
• Printing surface can be anything which is flat,
smooth and non-absorbent.
• The image will always be printed on reverse.

15. Collagraph
• Using a collage board where the materials are
assembled on a flat matrix to form a relief block
with different surface levels and textures.
• Printed using a roller press.
• Has characteristics of both intaglio and relief
depending on the materials.
• Coated with a varnish medium to protect the
textures from ink.