Two from the Prints Collection

Phobia. Hyun bob chung. Relief Print. From the Printmaking studio file cabinet, 238 Theatre Building

Watching the Old Die, Justin Myer. Color Etching. From the Printmaking studio file cabinet, 238 Theatre Building

Visual texture is integral to printmaking, a medium that is essentially the art of crafting a surface, applying ink to it, and transferring the inked image to paper. Textures can either be carved out of material, such as in relief prints, or the result of a build-up of ink and other chemicals on plate or stone. These two featured prints belong to a collection that has been built by printmaking faculty over the years, of work by students that, in their opinion, represents a particular mastery of the craft. The file-cabinets that housed these two prints also contain numerous other works produced by silk-screen, intaglio, relief, etching, and lithography.

The two prints are emblematic of two very different approaches to the medium, yet they both take advantage of the visual possibilities with their given materials. Myer's print on the right, the result of a photographic transfer onto a plate, has all the residual build-up of ink that is common when working with plates, yet used in such a way that it became part of the design of the image. According to Robin Gibson, the spotted affect was most likely achieved through splashing a bit of paint thinner over the surface. The relief print, on the other hand, relies purely on the initial linoleum carvings of the artist to create a landscape based solely on patterns.