An Idea

I haven't done any woodblock printing in a long time but it is a process I enjoy since it involves carving, wood and in the end, a great textured print. I was checking the links from my website to my Etsy shop this morning when I came across an artist's shop that offered..."original ink and colored pencil" art. Their prices were low for original work especially work as detailed as what they were doing. I asked myself how they could possibly do that? Either they are a lot faster than I am at drawing even small work that is so detailed or they were happy making 5 cents an hour. Then I realized how they worded the posting. I came to the conclusion that they were either doing hand made prints such as wood block or linoleum printing and then coloring it in or they were printing or having printed in some form the black line base and then coloring it in... still would be considered "individually handmade." There was no other way that I could see that they could duplicate the drawings so closely especially without adding that each piece was individually drawn and so would have variations from the one pictured.

This is an antique piece from India which was/is used to print on fabric. I have several of these that a friend gave me as a gift. I post this image to give you an idea of what a woodblock carved for printing looks like. You can either press directly to the surface you want to print like you would with a rubber stamp or you can use a brayer to roll over a piece of paper which is lain over the inked woodblock.

Anyway, enough about their business practices or at least, my guesses about their business practices and truth in advertising. What intrigued me was a way of replicating a drawing exactly each time but doing it entirely by hand...without the aid of personal or outside printer. And I remembered the old woodblock prints that I used to make my Christmas cards for several years. You get the rough textured quality of the wood...which I happen to love....but you still have great detail and each piece would be unique and original. I would love to offer these on cards again. That way, they wouldn't be too difficult for me to manage without a press and doing them by hand and the buyer could still frame them. It would work economically for me also. Offered as original and as is and considering the work involved in carving the woodblock, printing and coloring in (where applicable), I could ask a bit more for each card than I would with a card I had an outside printer do. I'm not talking "take a loan out" pricing. I mean they would probably sell around $8-$15 depending on whether they are colored in or not. I don't think that would be too high for a small original piece of art. This idea has me even more excited about getting back into my workshop and studio soon!