Assiniboine River Trail II

Assiniboine River Trail II.
Linocut. 
75cm x 105cm. 2015. 

Aside from experimenting and challenging myself with multiple etching plates this summer to expand my visual vocabulary and to loosen up my sense of composition (see post below), I wanted to do something more relaxing and I decided to return to my comfort zone of mapping Winnipeg. I returned to one of my favourite images of the Assiniboine River Trail. I had a good time translating parts of an earlier etching from 2009 into a somewhat larger block print (plate size 60cm x 90cm). Instead of using tonal gradations like I did in the etching, I worked a lot with patterning. I'm using a flooring linoleum (in a silly orange colour) by Tarkett. I was fortunate to find a large end roll at a thrift store a few years back, but I believe this material is still available at various flooring stores in different colours also. I did a lot of the carving at home on our little kitchen table evenings and weekends, since, as I said, it was kind of a side project.

When I ink the plate, I use a soft brayer with very little ink to lay down a thin coat of ink on the carved down part of the plate in the upper half of the print. That ink gets picked up only lightly during printing, giving me a soft grey in the background. This effect livens up the space quite nicely. To ink the surface of the plate I use a harder brayer. Well, it's time to print now.