Blending post-modern and traditional craftsmanship for innovation

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Polymer photogravure is a modern take on the copperplate photogravure process, which allows us to blend the best of modern technology with traditional craft to produce stunning hand-pulled prints.  

Film negatives, glass plates, digital files, cellphone images — all of these can be made into polymer gravure prints, and each print can be brought to life and given its own character with the artist’s attention to the traditional intaglio printmaker’s skills.

In this workshop you will learn the direct to plate method of making polymer plates, which requires no transparency or vacuum unit or dangerous chemicals. You will learn how to prepare your image files, and how to create your etched polymer plate.  When the plate is ready for ink, you’ll be introduced to the many ways an image can be manipulated in the inking and hand-wiping process.

This is a very hands-on process, which uses many beautiful papers and inks and hand-wiping techniques. You will learn the basics of using an intaglio press and a variety of traditional printing methods to create unique hand-made images.

All Images  © Jeanne Wells

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Instructor: Jeanne Wells

Photographer Jeanne Wells was born and raised on the Maine coast, where she has lived most of her life. She studied literature and writing at Lesley College in Cambridge, MA. Wells uses all forms and formats of cameras. She is self-taught in film and darkroom work, and has also studied wet collodion with Mark Osterman and Keliy Anderson-Staley. Well’s work is collected and exhibited internationally.  Over the years she has been published in many contemporary photo magazines, has been awarded a merit prize from Black and White magazine, and has been a top 200 Critical Mass finalist.  In 2018 her work was features in Polymer Photogravure, by Clay Harmon. Jeanne teaches and works at her studio, Things of This World Press, in Aroostook County, Maine. Her early life in both music and poetry continue to influence and inspire her visual work.

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