THE JOYS OF WOOD CUT

 THE JOYS OF WOOD CUT.

 

Wood cut is a great way to create strong dynamic images in print. It was  of the core print making techniques we covered this semester.

You can make a wood block anywhere really 

 

The process calls for bold work. One can make a wood block anywhere including out on location. When we got to print from our finish wood blocks we would relief ink and a transparent medium. 

 

Import is to plan the image before ‘cutting’, making sure everything works as a design.

Early Stages 

 

Our group had nine panels, one each. We employed graphic device of a river as the ‘red thread’ on each panel 49 x 69 cm we would once each panel is fully ‘carved’ out, lay all nine end to end and take a print (April 1^st and 4th) 

 

A highly focused activity and great to do as a group you can chat and still stay focused on job in hand and at the end of a session feel fully satisfied. 

Blocks ready for printing

The print - on one piece Chinese paper

My contribution 49 x 69 cm on Chinese paper

WOOD CUTS ACROSS THE YEARS

First used to decorate textiles in China 5C.  Woodblock printing on paper in Europe 14C -  took off with the development of moveable type. The master was Albrecht Dürer with black-line woodcuts, his near perfect images. Wood engraving with is sophisticated output grabbed the headlines 17 – 18C.  

 

The expressionistic potential of wood cuts was discovered by Edvard Munch and Paul Gauguin. 

In the 20C and the German Expressionists, stimulated by the vitality of medieval woodcuts, themselves gouged and roughly fashioned the wood to achieve a dynamic effect.

 

Wood cuts made a huge contribution to Japanese art - woodcuts satisfied the demand for ukiyo-e, (Japanese: “pictures of the floating world”) one of the most important genres of art of the Tokugawa period (1603–1867) in Japan. 

 Source: Britannica, The Editors of Encyclopaedia. "woodcut". Encyclopaedia Britannica, 2 Nov. 2021, https://www.britannica.com/art/woodcut

 Accessed 22 March 2022.