Linoleum Block Printing

Artist Statement

“Flags” as a series, is a group of prints that depicts a blank flag flying in a breeze. The ocean is all around it, and the sun and moon can be seen in the upper corner. There are also a few buildings that are being taken under by the waves. All of these pieces have some symbolism in them. I liked the idea of making one flag, that anyone could use, and that could be depicting anything. In the monochromatic print, I left the flag blank, making it so anyone could use it to describe anything. However, in the extended print, I colored in the modern pride flag, which symbolizes the freedom of being able to express yourself and a part of your beliefs. This flag is important to me and to my community, and therefore it is something that I wanted to show. The waves and buildings also mean something to me. In “Earth Flag,” I used greens and yellow colors for the ink. For this one, and all of them, the waves show the buildings being taken over or returned to the earth. The climate is continually a part of our lives, and even when our initial focus is on the flag, showing that the climate will never go away is important to me. It is a part of our lives, every day, and will be for as long as we live. This includes the beauty of the natural world, and also the destruction of climate change that we see today, and will only continue to see more of in the future. Finally, the sun and moon as one being is an idea that I like and wanted to show here. There are a lot of symbols in this series, and yet it is also quite simple. Just the waves, the sun, and moon, and a flag.

These works were all made using block printing ink, and a linoleum block. The linoleum block is what I used to carve out my design, which I then rolled printing ink onto. I used a roller to roll the ink onto the block, and a speedball carving tool to carve it beforehand. Once the block was carved and the ink rolled, I used blank white paper and pressed that over my inked block. Overall, printmaking does use many tools, but once you have a completed block you can use it over and over.

The process was a bit longer for these pieces. To start with there was creating the initial design. This was probably one of the hardest parts of making the series. I had the idea of trying to include nature somehow into the piece. However, I was very caught up in putting symbolism into the piece. After I created my design, I realized that I needed to draw first and think of the symbolism later. I was nervous about doing the design of a flag because I knew that I would probably end up drawing the pride flag, and I wasn’t sure if that was something that I wanted to put into my art quite yet. Once I picked the design and carved it on my linoleum block, I added colors. Carving the block I found to be difficult because I had a hard time visualizing the negative and positive space. However, after trying it first on one block, I was able to make it come together and start to actually print. I really enjoyed linoleum block printing and would be intrigued to do a longer project using this medium.