Living Prints Mezzotint On-line

Printing intaglio begins with covering the printing plate--which is textured, incised or etched with lines and pits that will make up the image--with printing ink. The ink is then rubbed off again, lightly, so that the texture holds ink, but smooth areas can not. The smooth areas are non-printing, and therefore will be white (assuming the print is on white paper, of course).

The printing press uses two rollers and a flat bed between, and layers of soft woolen blankets. The plate is placed on the flat bed, paper (usually made soft and damp with water) is put over the plate, and, over all, the wool blankets. Running the bed between the press' rollers forces the paper, now under high pressure, to emboss into the plate. The ink is imprinted onto the paper--even into the paper fiber itself.

This completes the printing of an intaglio print. If you are viewing the end and want to see the beginning, you may back-track or view other stages by selecting highlighted key words and images. If you want to go back to the first steps, the opening page, select here.

Above: The ink is thick, linseed-oil based and comes in many colors. Black is a traditional color for mezzotints.

Above: Inking the plate in this studio is started with a squeegee, a rubber-bladed scraper that works the thick ink into the plate texture.

Above: Wiping the plate is done by hand, using a loose-weave, stiff cotton tarlatan fabric.

Above: Printing the plate on an intaglio press, which has two smooth steel rollers and a flat bed. The plate is sandwiched between the bed and the top roller, with printing paper and forming blankets.

Each successive trial proof may indicate the artist must do more stippling, burnishing, scraping, and polishing. Afterward the inking and wiping is repeated and another proof is taken. There is a limit to how many times these steps can be repeated, because the wiping, cleaning and printing of the plate can actually wear down the plate texture. Later prints might be lighter in tone than the first ones.

©1999 Bill H. Ritchie, Jr. ritchie@seanet.com