Last autumn we were asked to be a featured artist in an event called Roadworks, a fund-raiser for the San Francisco Center for the Book-- the place where we learned to letterpress print!
This entailed creating an original design and carving it by hand into a 36" square linoleum block. At the event the block was inked up, placed on the street with a sheet of paper on top and run over by a steam roller. Yes- a steam roller!!
It's an exciting event that draws a great crowd and we were so honored to be asked to participate.
Here's a little "behind the scenes" on how the print came to be.
What started as a sketch became a digital illustration that was scaled from a 6" square to a 36" design printed in 6 inch blocks and assembled in a grid.
The fully assembled grid was then transferred on to the linoleum using a very stinky liquid solvent.
We carved the block one quadrant at a time using these Speedball carving tools.
I inked it up and took a proof:
Five of the prints sold at Roadworks to benefit SFCB and we have just produced a pair of editions that are for sale NOW in our Etsy shop. We have a very small number of prints available- 17 in black ink and 21 in red.
The image area is 36" x 36" and the paper size is 40" x 40. It was printed on a flatbed french etching press on archival 100% cotton Arches Rives BFK.
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