So Long, Winter! Collographs

We started this project shortly after returning to school in January, when it was cold and snow was imminent. It did not end up snowing much this year, but we went ahead with the idea anyway!

The students first did landscape drawings, gleaning inspiration from calendar photographs and various tree illustrations I found online. We discussed the elements of a landscape and made sure to include something in the foreground, middle ground and background of our drawings.

The idea drawings became the inspiration for a collograph print. We did a texture hunt to collect rubbings from around the classroom as research for making our plates. I had the students focus on a section of their original drawings which they recreated with various textured materials and adhered to a cardboard rectangle. They ended up having to simplify some very detailed drawings! Some of the materials we tried were craft foam, cardboard, yarn, ribbon, lace doilies, tin foil, felt… These plates by themselves are works of art! We made sure everything was glued down really well and had time to dry before our next class for printing.

Each student printed a total of one or two prints. Some of them we ended up re-inking and printing a second time overtop of the first. We managed to get everyone to print in one class period, which is an improvement on previous years! The following class, we discussed how to properly sign, title and edition the finished prints. It is always thrilling to peel back the paper and reveal a print- you can never fully envision how each piece will turn out!