Stickers, you wanna’ make stickers… Ok, what do you know about a printing press?

So we selected some sketches, tried them out using thick makers on paper (Draw thick lines to cut thick lines). The students worked out the composition on paper then transferred it over to the rubber printing blocks. Then the scary part KNIFES you can’t make cool stuff without them. After a quick safety lesson including graphic descriptions of possible wounds I passed out the block cutting knifes, happy to report no injuries. HURRAY! They cut thin then cut thick ribbions out of the rubber block, soon they could see the block taking shape. In the end very few revisions where needed. Now a lesson on rollers, ink, and the printing press, they were like fish to water and after a demo, they quietly worked in turns one would be inking their block while the other was pressing. I couldn’t have hoped for better.

The happiness of making tangible items in such a tactile way was expressed in their quiet smiles and the care put into storing away the work.

Working on cleaning up the block after a test print.

Lots of work goes into a single image, many sketches are done before the block is made.

Getting and even layer of ink.

Printing and inking

The Alien

The Dude