Acorn Linocut - Part 2

I finally finished printing the giant linocut acorns!  It has truly been quite a learning experience for me.  I learned that:

• It will take me months to complete a project like this
  
• You need to sharpen your linocut tool every day with a slipstrop
  
• I friggin love carving and listening to music 
  
• It is really hard to print a big black area evenly
  
• I need help to print this large
  
• I will have extremely strong arms if I keep this up
  
• I need to clean the basement so the whole house is not disrupted by large prints laying everywhere
  

The list could go on and on, but in the end this experience has only wet my appetite to do more.

I also had fun documenting the process.  Below you can see photos at each stage.

1) Complete full-size pencil sketch.

2) Transfer to Safety-Kut.

3) Carve design.

4) Ink the plate.

5) Print!

It was interesting to me because in the end I may have been just as excited about the photos of the plate and print as I was about the actual print.  Maybe down the road I will make some note cards of the photos. (You can click on the images to enlarge.)

As I said above, one of the biggest lessons I learned was that I need help during the printing process because the paper is so big.  I couldn't have done it without the help of my next door neighbor John.  He not only shot the following video of me inking the plate for the first time, but he helped me lay each sheet of paper down onto the inked plate and then meticulously rub every square inch until our arms were going to fall off.  Thank you, thank you, thank you, John!

(Music and permission given by Kodomo)

As you can see in the video this was the first time I inked the plate to make a test print.  I quickly realized I needed to buy a bigger brayer!

Below are a few more photos of the final print. If you are interested in purchasing a print visit NessyPress.com.