Fine art? Relief printing? Huh?

Last weekend Diane Divelbess gave an excellent workshop on Fine Art. The majority of us believe we are great crafters, but when it comes to fine art, we are at a loss. In fact, I would say we are down right intimidated.

Fine art is for the artists right?

Wrong.

In one day, Diane taught us how to transform everyday basic materials into a piece of art we all could be proud to frame and hang on the wall.

We started out with a cardboard base and built a printing block by gluing different pieces of texture on it with a glue stick: lace, screen, ribbon, textured paper, paper doilies, mesh, fabric, staples. Anything was fair game. We were even encouraged to cut away the top layer of the cardboard to expose the corrugated structure.



In many ways it was difficult to design the block because we really didn't know what the print would look like. Would the different textures show up? Did we have areas built up enough or too much? It was also hard to remember that it didn't matter that the block was composed with different colors and materials we wouldn't usually put together. The end result was going to be black. We had to try to envision what image the block itself would create.

When we were satisfied with our 'block', we coated it with polycrylic to prevent the porus surface of all the paper from absorbing the ink and to allow us to use the block more than one time.

While we waited for the polycrylic to dry, Diane put us through our paces with a few art exercises.

It was difficult for many of us to just let go and not worry about the end result of many of the exercises.

Diane also showed us another type of relief printing using water crayons and plastic flexible cutting boards. We drew an image on the cutting board with the crayons, placed a damp piece of paper on the image and rubbed it.

The crayon transferred from the plastic cutting board to the paper. The results were amazing.

By this time, our blocks were ready to be used. Diane gave a us a quick lesson about inking the block and making the print and set us loose.


After seeing how amazing the first print looked we all enthusiastically inked our blocks and began printing.



Guess what?

We mere crafters are artists and we can create fine art! (Diane knew it all along.)

To see more images from this workshop visit our flickr site.

Anyone can participate in the Super 17 workshops. In fact the more, the merrier! Check out the current workshop schedule and if you are interested in attending, drop us an email so we have enough supplies for everyone.