Linocut Prints Fine Art By Artist Doug Kemp

A linocut is a relief print that is produced like a woodcut but that uses lino as the surface from which the design is cut, carved as a template that is used for the printing

In making a Linocut basically, you take your design and use the negative space to paint the same picture over and over. It is an easy and effective method.

There are two methods:

1) Single block Linocut Prints. Here an initial cut pattern is printed for the whole (generally very limited) edition as the first part of the required image, and then the same block is further cut and printed again, registered with the original first printing.

This may be repeated a number of times. The final required image is therefore built up and the edition is limited to the number of prints made at the start and the subsequent cuttings since a constituent part of the image is lost each time. Picasso is known for using this method.

2) Multiblock Linocut Prints. This is a more common technique, used by many artists. A separate block (commonly 3 to 5) is cut for the different colours in the required image and printed sequentially.

A downside is that there has to be careful registration of the blocks at each stage and consideration of any colour upon a previously laid colour might change the overall effect. Another issue is that there might be some slight changes in colours, even within the same edition, due to differential inking effects.

This can still occur in the Single block method but generally to a lesser extent. Proof checking is critical but some slight variation, even within the same edition, is acceptable and might be considered desirable by some people by getting an unique (ish) copy.

A major benefit of Multiblock is that many different colour versions of the same image can be made and account for all tastes.

A Short History Of Making Linocut Prints: Linoleum was first invented in the 1860s, but wasn’t used as a medium for printing until the early 1900s where it was first used for making patterns on wallpaper!

Many artists… including Pablo Picasso & Henri Matisse have used linocuts as a medium, and today it is considered a respected art form in its own right, however, the benefits of using Giclee printing in terms of durability, quality and ease of use have seen the use of linocuts decline in recent years.

The 1920s saw the emergence of many female musicians and singers including African-American blues singer Bessie Smith who went on to inspire women singers from later eras and to this very day.

The video featured here from ‘Babylon Berlin’, a German TV series, encompases just about everything Doug loves about the late 1920s nightclub scene. The music, the vibe and the banana girls. Other fruits are also available.

Babylon Berlin is a German speaking neo-noir television series and is set in the latter years of the Weimar Republic (1929).

The story follows a police inspector on assignment to dismantle an extortion ring, and Charlotte Ritter, police clerk by day, flapper by night, who aspires to become a police inspector herself.