Milk carton printmaking - experimentations

A couple of weeks back I began exploring the possibilities of producing prints from plates that are made from milk cartons. Mainly the inner surface of the cartons which protect the liquid inside be they milk, juice or beverages derived from nuts or seeds.
This all started with a drop-in art activity for children that I volunteered to give at a local art center. I had seen a photo online of a young woman who had taken a printmaking workshop (not sure where or when) and she mentioned they were having fun making prints from milk cartons. This caught my interest. 

Anyhow I had been saving cartons for other uses (making bird feeders, snow scoops for snow sculpture construction) and discovered I had quite a few amassed in my cellar.  These had previously been rinsed out with warm water after their initial purpose was complete. I carefully cut the tops off then slit the sides using a utility blade . Some edges had wrinkles in the surface (perhaps from rough handling when these were put by staff on supermarket shelves or during transport from the shopping cart to my refridgerator) so I had to trim these wrinkled areas off the plate. I ended up with a collection of various square and rectangular plates. 


Here is the plate I  used for the demonstration (middle) and resulting print (left). The other piece (right) is from the front side of the original carton. I made a direct drawing using a drypoint needle right into the surface of the plain white reverse side of the plate.

The young artists who came to the drop-in had a lot of fun drawing on the plates and then scratching over the pencil line using needle tools. They wiped Akua intaglio ink into the lines and wiped the plates using newsprint and tissue paper. 

They got the opportunity to turn the etching press wheel when these were printed and then take their prints and plates home afterwards.
Since the plates were small it was easy to put several on at one time for a pass under the press roller. 

Above photo shows two square plate prints produced by a couple of young male artists (12 y/o). Akua Carbon black and Pthalo blue ink. Printed onto damp 250 Canson Edition white rag. 

I brought my plate home and decided to see what else I could do with it since it was still very printable after my initial demo print at the drop-in.
I once again applied Akua carbon black intaglio ink to the plate and wiped it back with a soft polyester mesh. Then I wiped the surface back with a piece of old yellow pages from an old phone book. I then spot dabbed colours of thinned Akua intaglio (thinned by adding a drop of Akua blending medium). These were carefully wiped using tissue over my pinky finger tip. This method is known as À la poupée.  

I set soaked and blotted Magnani cotton rag paper over top and ran it through my small etching press. 
The result was very favourable. 

I noticed a bit of peeling starting to occur around the line edges on the plate. I carefully lifted the peeling area of the surface and peeled it back making sure it didn't take up any of the elements inside the line. In essence this left slightly raised surface area. The area exposed from peeling was a bit rougher in texture. I again applied ink to the plate and wiped it back. However this time I selectively did a bit more removal of ink with tissue over finger tips and also a bit of strategic highlighting using cotton swabs. And the result came out like this in the photo below.

I have pulled a few more prints from the plate and fear now it is deteriorating fast. I believe that milk carton plates are good really only for small editions of perhaps up to 8 images.

Re-purpose household waste to make prints

Red fox study
drypoint engraving from plastic plate
edition of 11
2017

To learn more how this print was made scroll down through the post


I have been active once again in the studio producing some small and limited edition new work. Only in  this case I am using everyday common materials as surfaces from which the prints originate.
In fact, two materials specifically are being used where drypoint is the printmaking technique being employed.


Method #1 - paper card drypoint

The first material is the thin dense paper card used for the packaging of products such as cereal, pasta, crackers, teas, etc...
I have found that coating this with either several thin layers of shellac or acrylic varnish allows a fairly decent surface that can be scratched (or scribed) into with a sharp pointed tool. It is important that both sides of the plate be coated.

plate cut from cereal box board

reverse non-printed side is used for scribing image into.

Shellac is applied using a soft bristle brush over the surface 

and several layers are applied.

I have several tools available for using to work an image into the plate surface.

tools include traditional drypoint needle (metal tool 2nd from the right), diamond tip scriber (reddish wood handle tool), mechanical pencil holder with compass point inserted (far right)           and a home made needle with a steel darning needle inserted into a light wood dowel (between the diamond tip and metal etching needle).

An image can be drawn directly onto the surface using a dark graphite pencil or fine tip permanent marker or you can trace it on using carbon or graphite or saral transfer paper.

sketch of winter woods

sketch on tracing paper (right) with graphite paper over plate and image traced again over top (left)

Darken the graphite line transfer using a fine tip black permanent marker then scratch into these visible lines

The plate is inked either using Akua Intaglio ink (I modify it with a bit of magnesium carbonate powder to add a bit more stiffness) or Caligo Safewash etching ink (I add just a small amount of easy wipe compound to reduce the stiffness of this ink).

first proof print (right) and the plate positioned on the registration paper

Method #2 - plastic plate drypoint

I up-cycled a clear plastic lid from a seasonal greeting card box cover. I cut it into a couple of rectangular plates using a utility knife and a cork back metal ruler.
First draw the outline on your sketching paper and within the same size rectangle draw in your image. The plate can be placed over top. Draw in your sketch and then using tape secure the plate to the sketch. You will be able to view the sketch through the thin clear plate. Using a drypoint tool you can trace the image into the plate surface.

trace outline of your plate on the sketch paper. This will give you the dimensions of your sketch that will also fit within the plastic plate size.

Much like drawing you can add textural variations using cross-hatch, stipple. scribble. You can also use things like sandpaper or emery board to add rough texture to the plastic surface. The more worked a surface the darker the tone it will produce. 

scribed image in the plastic surface with thinner and denser line

and the resulting print from the plate on paper. The ink was a mix of Akua intaglio carbon black and pthalo blue.

The Hug

thin ink was wiped into the plate surface to reveal the image during the scribing process

plate inked and ready for printing

on the press bed awaiting dampened rag paper to be put over top

detail of print on paper

small edition of 11 drying

more drypoint experimentation on plastic plate

drypoint on packaging plastic

I was lucky to discover recently during a trip to Toronto a product for the visual arts found at Above Ground Art on McCaul St. This is simply known as packaging plastic. It is a bit thicker than acetate but is thinner and more flexible than plexiglass.
Knowing that I have several upcoming public art workshops I decided to get a sample piece and try out a drypoint image on this plastic sheet. If this worked out I would get more of this product for workshop participants to use.
My goal was to do something fairly simple in design that I could use as a demo piece. It would also be a surface that I might experiment a bit with a couple of different etching inks. These included Akua intaglio ink (soy) and Caligo safewash etching ink (which is derived from flax).
A photo I had taken last year of a swallowtail butterfly became the basis for the sketch which was placed underneath the plastic.
I noticed that when the thin protective plastic wrapping was removed from the clear plastic the sheet developed a slight bow. Apparently the product was cut from a larger roll into individual sheets. This was a bit of an issue but I compensated by placing double sided clear tape underneath to secure it flat to my working surface and give me good contact with my sketch underneath.

Using various sharp pointed tools including an etching needle, diamond tip drypoint needle and homemade darning needle embedded into the end of a piece of wood dowel I scribed lines into the surface. For the dark areas I rough up the surface using both the diamond point in a circular scribbling type motion using the wrist. I also lightly sanded a few areas with fine grit sandpaper to add a bit more texture.

the butterfly drypoint plate

Below are some of the results in photos. The image at the beginning of this post is a basic black ink print on Maidstone white rag. It was printed using Akua intaglio carbon black with a 25% addition of pthalo blue.

I also experimented with printing the drypoint into a monotype made from a separate plate. A piece of Duralar wet media film was cut to the same dimensions of the drypoint plate. I put some tabs of double sided photo mounting tape in between to keep the top plate from slipping during the application of the thinned akua intaglio inks (made a bit more fluid with the addition of a small amount of blending medium). I used the drypoint below as my guide for where to paint in colours of ink. The monotype plate was carefully taken off and placing a piece of lightly misted rag paper I rubbed the back of the paper using my hand and a rubbing stick to transfer ink.

monotype on duralar wet media film painted

on with a brush using thinned akua intaglio inks

Then I took the drypoint plate and using careful steady hand/eye coordination set that facedown over the monotype. I ever so carefully flipped this over and set it on the bed of my small etching press. I lay the 3 layers of felts over top and passed this under the top roller.

drypoint and monotype

Finally I printed a black and white from the plate but this time around using Caligo safewash etching ink (carbon black) and added a minute amount of wiping compound.

The print was fastened to a thin piece of board and allowed several days to dry. I applied watercolour into the print and came up with the following image that is pretty close to what I see in my photo reference:

Swallowtail butterfly

hand coloured drypoint

2013

Some prints from a long time ago

I found a few photos of some of my earlier printmaking adventures that not many have seen so thought I would share these with my blog followers.

two colour linocut from 2006
a study of a sailing regatta in Thunder Bay

A relief print I made in 2007 from a piece of scratchfoam.
I drew into the thin foam plate using a ballpoint pen to create the relief.
Instead of printing black ink onto white paper white ink was applied and then hand burnished onto a piece of black stonehenge paper.
Inspired by a visit to Killarney Provincial Park near Sudbury, Ontario.

In 2009 I took a scan of a black ink print on white paper from one of my larger carved pieces of linoleum.
 I resized and then reversed the image, printed it onto an inkjet transparency and exposed it as a negative on to a small piece of solar plate. The plate was developed and I applied ink with a brayer on the surface and printed it as a relief image using block oil based ink onto 140 lb cold press watercolour paper. I then applied hand colouring into the print using watercolour. You can get a sense of the size of the printed image as the frame dimensions measure 5 x 7 inches, so it in effect is a miniature print.

2005

another experiment of relief printing from four blocks
made from 1/16 inch thick craftfoam. Pieces were cut out and glued onto a cardboard base sheet.

A cosy place 2006
This is a small drypoint study printed from a drawing
 made with a drypoint needle into thin piece of aluminum plate

Heat/Sunspot lover 1987
I made this relief print using a product called Fujiblock that was made by the UK based Windsor and Newton Company known for their fine grade watercolour paints
The block was a stiff piece of cardboard that had a thin layer of felt material glued on top. You cut away the surface material using a double bladed utility knife, then peeled off the thin cut lines and then applied watercolour onto the remaining surface. The media was allowed to dry then reactivated by misting or you could also print onto damp paper to give a unique white line print.

this was a multiple plate square format collagraph
2006

Sunflower linoluem relief block print with hand colouring
2005

Songbird
2005
a simple relief print from a piece of 1/2 inch blue building grade styrofoam that I drew into with a ballpoint pen. I hand burnished the black ink coated block onto torn piece of amber colour japanese Chiri paper.
It has been mounted to float inside a birch shadow box frame.

another multiple plate collagraph
2005

collagraph/monotype
2005