PRINTMAKING

COLLAGRAPH

    To create these, I found during many explorations, a tow boat mooring line entangled within riverbank tree branches. After retrieving this line, weighing upwards of thirty pounds, it was placed in the sun to dry for several weeks.  It was then carefully brushed, to remove large leaves, mud, and sand debris.  After small pieces of the rope were selected and removed, they were inked, arranged on a press bed, and printed as a collagraph/relief print.  In this method of monotype printing each print is unique; there is never, truly, any control of the outcome.  The prints are treated as sequential, individual studies.  This allows each rope piece to tell a different story, without the artist's interference with its message.  Then, the story can continue, in the viewer's response to and interpretation of the print. Some prints also include foraged/found plastic.