SCREEN PRINTING

Hello friends!

Today I join you with a print I made last year in December. It's a SCREEN PRINT, which is essentially forcing ink through a stencil wrought onto mesh. Silk screen is a widely used method for creating highly replicable images that can be printed on a multitude of surfaces.

Let's break it down!

The method I used to transfer my images onto the screen is widely used by printmakers. The screen itself is coated with what is known as "photo emulsion", which is essentially a light sensitive paint that covers the whole screen.

In this process, screen printing is versatile in terms of creating an image. You simply create an image with opaque drawing or painting materials, such as india ink or even acrylic paint on clear or frosted mylar. Anything you can think of, as long as it is opaque can essentially be turned into a stencil on the screen, and in reference to the light-sensitive paint, here is how that works:

The image itself is placed onto an exposure unit (which might look like a giant scanner, or a tiny tanning bed to someone unfamiliar with them) and the screen goes on top of the image. The lid of the exposure unit is closed and a vacuum seal comes on while ultraviolet light bombards the screen. The key here is that the opaque drawing BLOCKS OUT the light in the gestures of the drawing itself, thus leaving the photo emulsion untouched by the rays of the light bed. Once the image is done "burning", you then move over to was the screen with water and like magic, the marks the image blocked out from the light dissolve in the photo emulsion, leaving you with a precision stencil of your drawing! It's really awesome to watch it happen and something you're thrilled to see when you do it correctly.

Once the screen is dry, you then may set up your station. Silk screen ink is a water based acrylic ink that dries quickly, so you must work fast. It is advisable to have all of your paper (or other materials) ready to be printed because it can go very quickly, but if you're lagging getting other things together while you're printing, the tinier marks of your stencil might dry up with ink and thus alter the gestures of your images. The ink is forced through the screen by use of a squeegee that is larger than the image itself. If you make more passes, the more opaque the print will be, but you also run risk for over-flooding the screen, and all of this takes some practice to get just right. But the results are awesome for any artist interested in making prints!

My image presented here was originally conceived as a diptych, but it ended up taking on a different life. Required to be only three layers for the project grade, I actually printed on this piece seven different times. I love mythology and the myth of Hades, the Greek god of the Underworld, and Persephone, the daughter of the Earth Goddess, Demeter, has always been one of my favorites. I love every myth about the underworld, such as Orpheus & Eurydice, and Thetis dipping her infant son, Achilles, in the river Styx...

For those of you who are unfamiliar with this story, Hades abducts Persephone and brings her the underworld and bequeaths that she can leave anytime she wants, so long as she doesn't touch anything or eat anything. While Persephone is in the underworld, she notices an irresistible pomegranate tree and was so tempted she forgot the rules Hades had set, and ate of its fruit. A beautiful young goddess herself, Hades was more than happy to take her as his prisoner and subsequently make Persephone his Queen. As the weeks and months went by, Demeter, the Earth goddess, begins to despair that her daughter is missing and when she finds out the nature of her imprisonment in the underworld, falls into a deep depression. The fair weather of earth deteriorates because of the Earth goddess's melancholy and is replaced with bitter cold and awful, unfruitful weather. Mortals pray to Zeus (the King of the gods) for his mercy and seeing his devotees and Demeter herself in such a predicament, he summons Hades to explain his underhanded actions. Rules are rules, and Hades is the ruler of the underworld, so his authority must be respected, however, Zeus strikes a deal out of pity for Persephone's poor mother and the people of the overworld. Persephone will spend half of the year in the underworld with Hades, and half of the year on Olympus with her mother. Thus, here on Earth we have the warm months of spring and summer when Persephone, the nymph of the seasons, is present and with her mother. And when she is with her husband in Hades, we have the colder months of autumn and winter.

Well, that's my interpretation of it anyway

My print features Hades and Persephone in their respective landscapes, with a central image of Persephone's initial descent into the underworld, never to be the same again.

Print is 22x30" on Rives BFK