Printmaking is the process of creating artworks by printing, normally on paper, but also on fabric, wood, metal, and other surfaces. "Traditional printmaking" normally covers only the process of creating prints using a hand processed technique, rather than a photographic reproduction of a visual artwork which would be printed using an electronic machine ; however, there is some cross-over between traditional and digital printmaking, including risograph.
Woodcut is a relief printing technique in printmaking. An artist carves an image into the surface of a block of wood—typically with gouges—leaving the printing parts level with the surface while removing the non-printing parts. Areas that the artist cuts away carry no ink, while characters or images at surface level carry the ink to produce the print. The block is cut along the wood grain. The surface is covered with ink by rolling over the surface with an ink-covered roller (brayer), leaving ink upon the flat surface but not in the non-printing areas.
Linocut, also known as lino print, lino printing or linoleum art, is a printmaking technique, a variant of woodcut in which a sheet of linoleum is used for a relief surface. A design is cut into the linoleum surface with a sharp knife, V-shaped chisel or gouge, with the raised (uncarved) areas representing a reversal of the parts to show printed. The linoleum sheet is inked with a roller, and then impressed onto paper or fabric. The actual printing can be done by hand or with a printing press.
Intaglio is the family of printing and printmaking techniques in which the image is incised into a surface and the incised line or sunken area holds the ink. It is the direct opposite of a relief print where the parts of the matrix that make the image stand above the main surface.
Robert Hamilton Blackburn was an African-American artist, teacher, and master printmaker.
Harry Gottlieb was an American painter, screen printer, lithographer, and educator.
An old master print is a work of art produced by a printing process within the Western tradition. The term remains current in the art trade, and there is no easy alternative in English to distinguish the works of "fine art" produced in printmaking from the vast range of decorative, utilitarian and popular prints that grew rapidly alongside the artistic print from the 15th century onwards. Fifteenth-century prints are sufficiently rare that they are classed as old master prints even if they are of crude or merely workmanlike artistic quality. A date of about 1830 is usually taken as marking the end of the period whose prints are covered by this term.
Richard Mock was a printmaker, painter, sculptor, and editorial cartoonist. Mock was best known for his linocut illustrations that appeared on the Op-Ed page of The New York Times from 1980 through 1996.
Edmond Casarella was an American printmaker, painter, and sculptor based in the New York metropolitan area. He developed the innovative use of a layered cardboard printing matrix that could be carved like a woodcut, enabling the inexpensive creation of large-scale works.
Bill Fick is a printmaker living and working in Durham, North Carolina. Fick is the director of Cockeyed Press, which specializes in the production of satirical linocut prints and book production. He is also a member of the Outlaw Printmakers. Fick, along with Beth Grabowski authored a book, Printmaking: A Complete Guide to Materials & Processes in 2009.
Somnath Hore (1921-2006) was an Indian sculptor and printmaker. His sketches, sculptures and prints were a reaction to major historical crises and events of 20th century Bengal, such as the Bengal Famine of 1943 and the Tebhaga movement. He was a recipient of the Indian civilian honour of the Padma Bhushan.
Tom Huck, also spelled Hück,, is an American printmaker best known for his large-scale satirical woodcuts. From 1999 to 2020 Hück worked out of a studio in downtown St. Louis. In 2020 he moved Evil Prints to Park Hill, Missouri.
Sean Starwars is a printmaker living and working in Laurel, Mississippi. He is a relief printmaking artist specializing in woodcut printmaking. He is also a member of the Outlaw Printmakers.
Peter Julian is an American artist best known for his Neo-expressionist paintings in the 1980s. His first major exhibition was in New York in 1982 at The New Museum as part of the museum’s annual “New Work/New York” series of exhibitions.
Ericka Walker is an American artist and printmaker. She lives and works in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada.
Jack Glover is an American artist living and working in Richmond, Virginia.
Clare Romano (1922–2017) was an internationally known American printmaker and painter with works in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art, the Smithsonian American Art Museum, the Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum and other major collections. As an advocate, innovator, and educator in the field of printmaking, Romano has co-authored in collaboration with her husband, John Ross, The Complete Printmaker (1972), The Complete Collagraph (1980), and several other printmaking manuals that have become standard texts for universities. They founded their High Tide Press for artists books in 1991.
Byron Gordon McKeeby (1936-1984) was an American artist, educator and master printmaker known primarily for lithography. McKeeby's interest dovetailed with a burgeoning contemporary community in advancing lithography as an art form. He was active in all form of print exhibition. He built a full scope printmaking department of rank at the University of Tennessee that exists today.
Sylvia Solochek Walters is an American artist and educator. She has produced drawings, paintings and collage works in her career, but is best known for complex woodcut prints created through the "reduction and stencil" process. Her work combines elements of realist, decorative and formalist art, flat and illusionistic space, and varied patterning and textures. She has largely focused on portraits, still lifes and domestic interiors, and collage-like combinations of personal symbolism—concerns that writers often align with early feminist art.
Master printmakers or master printers are specialized technicians who hand-print editions of works of an artist in printmaking. Master printmakers often own and/or operate their own printmaking studio or print shop. Business activities of a Master printshop may include: publishing and printing services, educational workshops or classes, mentorship of artists, and artist residencies.
