Coal tit reduction lino print

Happy to show you this finished new bird portrait! It’s a reduction linoleum print with 12 (!) colour layers. It’s the 14th of this series of bird portraits I’m working on. The ,at first glance, somewhat more muted colour palette of the Coal tit was quite a challenge. It required great precision to mix exactly the right color that could be printed on top of the previous color. I mix all the colors myself and had to make a lot of test prints to achieve the lovely shine in the dark plumage and to make the different lighter shades fit well together. Never before had it happened that there was still this much linoleum left as a printing surface with the last color layer because of the black crown. I can tell you this was quite nerve-wracking to print as the last layer! You may have noticed that I use the transparency of certain colors to get a different shade in the next layer. For example I never use a standard black ink, which I find too matte. I prefer to build up the black from different shades on top of each other which creates a nice deep color. In addition, as I progress through the process of this series I challenge myself more and more with detail which I find super fun and interesting. It’s a limited edition, for each color layer I carved more linoleum from the same block of linoleum. As a result, the linoleum block is reduced and not suitable anymore for reprinting. Each color has to dry for at least 24 hours between printing layers, depending on the weather and color.

DETAILS