Sam Marshall - Linocut: A Creative Guide to Making Beautiful Prints

HERBERT PRESS

Bloomsbury Publishing Plc

50 Bedford Square, London, WC1B 3DP, UK

29 Earlsfort Terrace, Dublin 2, Ireland

This electronic edition published in 2023 by Bloomsbury Publishing Plc

BLOOMSBURY, HERBERT PRESS and the Herbert Press logo are trademarks of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc

First published in Great Britain in 2023

Copyright Sam Marshall, 2023

Sam Marshall has asserted her right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as Author of this work

All rights reserved
You may not copy, distribute, transmit, reproduce or otherwise make available this publication (or any part of it) in any form, or by any means (including without limitation electronic, digital, optical, mechanical, photocopying, printing, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of the publisher. Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.

Bloomsbury Publishing Plc does not have any control over, or responsibility for, any third-party websites referred to or in this book. All internet addresses given in this book were correct at the time of going to press. The author and publisher regret any inconvenience caused if addresses have changed or sites have ceased to exist, but can accept no responsibility for any such changes

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

Library of Congress Cataloguing-in-Publication data has been applied for

ISBN: 978-1-7899-4070-1 (PB)
ISBN: 978-1-7899-4068-8 (eBook)
ISBN: 978-1-7899-4067-1 (ePDF)

To find out more about our authors and their books please visit www.bloomsbury.com where you will find extracts, author interviews and details of forthcoming events, and to be the first to hear about latest releases and special offers, sign up for our newsletters.

CONTENTS

Hi, Im Sam. Im a printmaker, living in rural Northamptonshire with my miniature dachshund, Miss Marple. I have a print studio in my garden where I make all my work and run my workshops, both in person and online. Ive been printmaking for over twenty years now. I started with etching and spent a good few years concentrating solely on this. However, over time, I wanted to vary my practice and include more dynamic colours in my work, so linocut seemed to be the obvious next step.

At first, I must confess, I really struggled with linocut. I was teaching myself using blunt tools and old lino. I just couldnt understand how so many people could achieve such amazing results with what seemed, to me, to be an unwieldy technique. However, Im stubborn and dont like to be defeated, so I battled on.

I did a lot of research, bought better tools and, most importantly, kept practising and very soon I was hooked. At this point I was living in London; I didnt have a studio or a lot of space so I made do with what I had and repurposed a corner of my bedroom into my studio it served as my drawing space as well as a carving, inking and printing area. I was amazed by how much I could achieve with so few tools and equipment.

The fact that linocut can be carried out at home, on your kitchen table, is just one of the things that attracted me to it. I love the spontaneity of the marks you can make with the tools, the quality of lines that can be produced and how varied they can be. I find the whole process really helpful for my busy mind; the fact that there are so many different stages of producing a print has taught me to be much more patient. The physical act of carving can also be really meditative. I hear this from my students, too; they often end a three-hour session by saying how much calmer they feel. Concentrating solely on one task for a couple of hours can have a transformative effect.

I have been teaching linocut for over ten years now and Ive noticed that students often struggle with subject matter; they frequently tell me that they dont know where to start or what to base their work on. Its easy to understand why linocut can be so daunting! The marks are very definite and you cant easily erase your mistakes.

Another thing I hear so often is I cant draw, which makes me feel sad, as I truly believe we can all make our own unique marks. Drawing is at the heart of my practice I always start off with a sketch and although this book does not contain drawing exercises as such, every project begins with a drawing. I encourage you to just give it a go and see what you come up with. This book is designed to help you build up your confidence with drawing, to be inspired to discover your subject matter and to improve your printmaking skills. I want you to really enjoy the whole process of linocut from the drawing to the carving, from the inking to the printing and then showing them off at the end. I will support you to make mistakes, to take risks and to turn things upside down and see what happens.

My own work is autobiographical. I make prints about my life and the stories it contains. I use my everyday surroundings as inspiration, drawing all the time and always looking for a way to include what I see in my prints. During the first lockdown, I made a series of linocuts that documented my life in the garden that summer, which included mowing the lawn incessantly as I found it soothed my anxious mind! In April 2019, I visited Japan for fifteen days. While I was there I sketched, made notes and took photographs to record every day of my trip, then when I got back to the studio I turned them into a series of fifteen linocuts that told my daily stories.

I aim to use my own practice as a guide to help inspire your own ideas. Throughout this book, you will work through a series of projects that will not only develop your practical skills but will also help you to build up the confidence to make work that is personal to you and tells your stories. I am hopeful (and quietly confident!) that as you progress through the book you will find your own unique style which highlights just how you see and experience the world. It will be a lovely record of your own life and journey.

This book is suitable for complete beginners as well as those of you who have some experience and want to expand upon and enhance your skills. I have structured the projects so they build up in complexity and allow your skills to develop, however, feel free to dip in and out of the book as you like.

For each project I go through exactly what is entailed, providing step-by-step instructions and sharing my own progress as I work through the tasks. Im keen to get you drawing, so each project starts off with a sketch just give it a go and remember its all about having fun and enjoying what you are doing. By all means, take photos to remind you of what it is you are drawing, but remember that nothing beats a drawing done on the spot with your hand and eye responding directly to what is in front of you making your own unique marks.