Collagraph Printmaking

Altered Collagraph Print

The story behind this piece was when I looked at a stock photo of a lighthouse, I saw how many layers and textures there are and I wanted to replicate it on my printing plate, I just used cardboard, but when I added mod podge, it caused one type of cardboard to bubble and give off a weird texture which I thought was cool. This piece relates to my life because I live in Maine and there are a few lighthouses here.

For the altered print, I used brown acrylic paint on my collagraph plate and I used the second print I did because it looked the best, I then used my crayons that I had and colored in the sky and water, then I added the light from the lighthouse.

I started off with layering not a lot of brown acrylic paint on my plate, but after the first print—which isn't shown—I realized that I needed more, so I did it again and it turned out better as you can see. I then let my piece dry and took the time to wash my plate, but I didn't add enough mod podge and the plate no longer had much thickness and some pieces were falling off, but after the print dried I was able to add crayon and colored in the print. My art evolved when I added the crayon and colored it in making it more exciting. My next steps would be to add more detail.