Make and Share Craft Tutorials
About
Published
about 1 year ago
Time
Difficulty
After examining the gnarled contours of sweet potatoes ?at the market, I knew I wanted to make a print that took advantage of the variety of shapes. I used a couple types of potatoes to achieve a fuller spectrum of shapes and sizes, and I let the natural contours guide my linoleum cutter.
I chose a durable and inexpensive canvas cloth to make
this picnic blanket and napkins. I chose it for several ?reasons: Its finished edges saved me time, and I wanted to utilize the tooth of the canvas to provide interesting texture ?to my print. And the price was so low that I could have ?fun printing and not worry about ruining some expensive ?blanket! Also, the massive size of the cloth allowed me to ?cut off a large piece to be used for matching napkins and ?a test piece of fabric to boot!
Reader Offer: Print Workshop 9780307586544, RRP £14.99, offer price £11.24 plus p&p. To order please call 01273 488005 or go to www.thegmcgroup.com and quote code: R3607. Closing date: 30th June 2012. Please note: p&p is £2.95 for the first item and £1.95 for each additional item (different rates apply for delivery outside of the UK)
Crafts
Extract from
Print Workshop: Hand-Printing Techniques and Truly Original Projects by Christine Schmidt
Published by Potter Craft
This is a book for low budgets and high ambition. Read it and you will learn how to put images of things onto other things. You will start by rolling up your sleeves. Your shirt will be stained anyways. At some point, you will harness the power of the sun. Go ahead, look inside. You will see that you do not need a fancy studio to print a T-shirt or a picnic blanket. There is no specialized machine required to print anything you want in any room you want. A mural, a dartboard, a deck of cards, these are all possible. In a week or a month, you will wake up to find you know words like acetate and substrate. You will be comfortable talking about ink and shopping at military supply stores. Perhaps most important of all, you will be printing images of things on...
© 2013 Christine Schmidt / Potter Craft · Reproduced with permission.Instructions
You Will Need
- Paint Palette
- 4" (10cm) Foam Brayer
- Fabric screen printing Ink
- Pinking Shears
- 4' x 15' (1.2m x 4.5m) canvas Drop Cloth with finished edges
- Large, old Blanket (for a drop cloth)
- Large kitchen Knife
- Assorted sizes of sweet and russet Potatoes
- Cutting Board
- Linoleum Carving Tools with U-gouge blade
- Popsicle Sticks
- Project Cost
- Reasonably Priced
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1
Wash the drop cloth in warm water; dry and iron it.
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2
Fold the drop cloth in half and cut along the fold with ?pinking shears. Piece A will be the picnic blanket. From the ?other piece cut four 20" (51cm) squares with the pinking ?shears. Pieces B, C, D, and E will be used for the napkins; ?the remaining piece F will be test fabric (X).
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3
Lay the old blanket on a flat work surface; a clean floor ?works nicely.
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4
On a cutting board, use the kitchen knife to split ?the potatoes in half lengthwise with one swift motion ?to create 2 oblong shapes.
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5
Hold a potato half steady and carve (pushing the knife away from you) the midrib of a leaf as shown (Y). Carve veins of the leaf in assorted patterns (Z).
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6
Repeat steps 4 and 5 for the other potato halves.
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7
With a Popsicle stick, dab 2 spoonfuls of printing ink onto the palette. Run the foam roller through the ink and then pick up the brayer. Roll the brayer through the ink again and again until the foam roller is evenly saturated with ink.
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8
Roll the ink firmly over a potato half, then press the potato firmly onto the test fabric. ?You can use both hands to press down on the potato if necessary.
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9
Once you have a good sense of how to print with the potato, repeat step 8 with all your carved potatoes until you achieve a leaf-print design that covers the whole blanket as well as your napkins.
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10
Heat-set the ink according to manufacturer’s instructions.
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