About “Winter”

 
The Inspiration “Winter” is a picture of ice covered branches of a nearby dogwood tree. The icing occurred in early December 2013 and foreshadowed one of the longest and most frigid winters Washington has experienced in decades. “Winter” was made as a companion print to two earlier flower pictures: “Spring” and “Summer”. My goal is to create a seasonal series. The Print “Winter” is an 8 color print. Metallic silver was used as a foundation, an underlayment, for the branches and ice. Then, three colors were used for the background, a violet, a turquoise, and a light yellow, the latter of which was blended with one of the first two to create two different blended backgrounds. This print was made using the four-color CMYK process that is used by many commercial printers as well as for printing color pictures in newspapers. “CMYK” stands for four colors (cyan, magenta, yellow, and black). A halftone plate is created for each process color and is printed in such a way that the four colors are juxtaposed with one another so that the eye perceives a range of colors. In the case of “Winter”, the palette is pretty much limited to dark brown tones and black, which are created using the four process colors. Looked at from a distance, the halftone dots fade into the overall image but, close-up, you can see cyan, magenta, yellow, as well as black. The prints were made on Arches 88 paper. Images are 12½” x 12½” on 19” x 19” sheets. Speedball Acrylic Screen Printing Inks were used. Adobe Photoshop was used for developing the screenprinting plates. Eleven prints are included in the edition, five with a violet background and six with a turquoise background. The project was completed in May 2014. Progression Series The print progression showing the development of “Winter” can be seen in a series of five figures. The first two images show the blended backgrounds which were created using four colors printed in three layers. These are followed by four additional images showing the CMYK layers.
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Plates1-2 (Background)

Plates 1-3 (Cyan)

Plates 1-5 (Yellow)

Plates 1-4 (Magenta)

Plates 1-6 (Black) (Final Print)