Small child screen print
Screen print completed today, 2nd September 2021 at Sonsoles in Peckham. The idea is based around sitting in the Horniman museum gardens and just looking at what’s in front of me. The image is of a photograph of a young girl that I bought in a flea market in Paris some years ago.
This took a few weeks to complete and there were a number of issues with the printing especially with the pink halftone.
The first two layers printed relatively easily although there were some registrations issues. I had put registration marks onto the acetates but they were too fine and didn’t show up. I will place the registration marks at the top and bottom of the image next time and make them a bit thicker.
After exposing the acetate for the pink halftone layer and printing this onto newsprint I noticed that there was a mark in the hair area of the image. This would show up on each print. I decided to strip the image down and start again. After re coating the screen and trying the printing of the halftone again, the ink appeared to be too thin and wasn’t covering over the grey image in the background. I bought some magenta ink from Sonsoles and mixed it with my colour to make it more powerful.
After re coating the screen and beginning to reprint the pink halftone I found that the screen hadn’t been washed out enough. Not all of the halftone was visible. The screen needed to be washed out with the high pressure jet to expose all of the fine halftone.
Starting the printing again the ink began to dry on the screen. I needed to add some extra screen print medium to the ink, wash the screen down on the press and start again.
Onto the final dark blue layer which went fairly easily. The main thing I learnt from these sessions is that you need patience and time when screen printing!