New year, new print
Early access for readers of Dapple Scrumping
Well, on the very last day of 2024 I printed the tenth and final layer of this reduction print. Readers of previous instalments will know this has been a particularly troublesome print so it became really important to me to put it to bed before starting the new year. Despite (or perhaps because of) the times I thought it would never be finished, I have to say I am rather pleased with it. Perhaps a subconscious premonition of doom made me start this print with more pieces of paper than usual, but it meant that even after the haunted ink debacle and the prints that were lost to it, I have still managed to salvage an edition of 10.
‘September’ has now had time to dry and has been signed and dated ‘2024’ - the last print to carry that date. It’s available at the link below, which is exclusive to Substack readers today and tomorrow. It will then go in my public shop on Sunday.
Hypothesis, experiment, conclusion
This print was the first I made using a new registration method which I wrote about here:
So what was the result? Well the registration was faultless and saved my bacon, because even with the weird ink issue and the prints lost that way, the fact I didn’t lose any further prints to registration mishaps is why I still have an edition of 10.
I will not however be using plywood again. It is just not flat enough and it took me FOREVER, and a lot of elbow grease, and frustration, to get the ink evenly over the paper. I will try again with MDF. Watch this space.
What next
I have started drawing the block for my first print of 2025. I am travelling back across the Atlantic to Canada for this image, which is a memory of our visit to family last summer. There is a possibly unwise amount of moving water in it which means a) a lot of carving white bits before I even print the first layer, and b) this print is going be what is politely called ‘challenging’. On the plus side, the time it will take to do the initial carving gives me a chance to get to the DIY store, buy some MDF and make a new registration device.
Shop closure
Just to let you know my shop will be closing for orders next weekend (from 18th January) while I spend some time taking stock, both of prints and life, and attending to family commitments. It will re-open in early February.
Cheerio for now. I’ll pop back when I’ve started printing my new linoprint so you can see how the water is coming on, and whether switching to MDF for the registration jig has improved things.
Jane
Another gorgeous print. Makes me feel warm looking at it x