Inked up

 

Over the February school holidays I ran two workshops for children at Prema Arts Centre, teaching relief printing. 

The classes were very well attended and the children produced some fantastic results.  The younger group [aged 5-7] used polystyrene printing blocks, making marks on the surface with pencils, cooky cutters and even lego.  We worked on a theme of butterflies and flowers.  These children really enjoyed experimenting with mixing colours and putting muliple colours on each block.  Everybody had a go at rolling out the ink and using my printing press as well as wooden spoons to burnish.

 

The older children [age 8-10] started with lino printing blocks and they used lino cutting tools to make their designs.   We used a theme of leaves and trees to start off with, but with the introduction of polystyrene blocks to speed things along there were soon all sorts of woodland creatures appearing!  As well as everyone producing their own individual prints we also produced one large shared piece. I thought this was really successful and I was hugely impressed with the children's ideas and creativity and their ability to work together.