January 31, 2012

Sea Themed Collographs: 3rd Grade





This may sound crazy, but I had never done Collograph Printing before!?!?!  I never had print making in college, and just kind of picked up things as I've been teaching.  Incised Plate Printing & Mono-Printing I have grown to love!!!!  So this is my first go at doing collographs with my students.  I feel like I've learned a lot through the experience...and next time they'll turn out better!  Not that it is the students fault at all....just Mr. E has got to get his feet under him when instructing how to create collographs!  Feel free to share your tips and such in the comment section!  Would love to hear what works for you!!

13 comments:

  1. They look pretty good to me. What would you do differently??

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  2. Ted -
    I taught collographs at the first grade level. After gluing (Elmer's), I had them flip the plate over onto the chair seat, sit on it and count to 60!

    We also used some textured papers (such as the paper cup holders from Starbucks).

    Your collographs look great and I bet your students had a lot of fun making them.

    Rina

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  3. Ted -

    Oops! One more thing....did you do a crayon rubbing before you printed?

    Rina

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  4. Rina, I did not do a crayon rubbing...are you suppose to? What would that do to it?? It is just printing ink on white paper. Some of the ink I used two colors.

    Christie...I think I'd use some more textured paper...maybe thicker paper too. I don't know. I am open to suggestions about how to improve it! :)

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  5. They look really good - I'd never know it was your first go at it. I really like using craft foam sheets (easy to cut and a good texture for printing) and hole punchers are a great way to add more interest to your shapes - imagine a starfish with lots of holes punched out - makes a nice texture. Yarn also looks really good if glued well.

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  6. matt board scraps and fun foam is the trick to a good collograph. We always cut our shapes out of the fun foam and glue them onto mattboard scraps...cardboard if needed. Yarn and pipe cleaners also work 80%+ of the time.

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  7. Crayon rubbing would be a quick way to check what the pic would look like. I had a bunch of old books in the art room, and I used to have them ink, put the paper on top, sandwich it in the book and sit on it, to get a better press. I also have them rub a thin layer of glue over the whole plate when they are done building it-it makes for smoother inking, and less absorbing of ink into the printing plate. Glue line prints are always fun too!

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  8. oh. my. goodness! i started collographs today with my 4th graders! first the weaving, now the printing... great minds think alike! we used tagboard and good ol glue sticks... we just started making the plate today and will be printing next week.. will post pictures soon : )

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  9. I used cut up pieces of matt board and students used washable markers like Mr. Sketch to color in. I sprayed a white paper with water and then students flipped their collagraph 'plate' onto the wet paper and pressed...here's the blog post:
    http://dalimoustache.blogspot.com/2010/01/collagraphs.html
    This is fun because you can use LOTS of colors rather than just one.

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  10. Ted! You opened up a great conversation about collographs! I, too, have never done this type of printmaking but now that I've read all of these comments, I'm gonna try it! Love the suggestion to put a layer of glue over the whole thing before printing-GENIUS!

    :)Pat

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  11. Ren, I just saw your post... I like that! I've never done it that way before... hmmm....... just in time before I do my prints... I think I'll just have to try it that way! First timers all around : )

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  12. I have only done a collograph lesson once, but a really inexpensive way to make them is out of file cabinet manila folders. I asked my husband to bring a bunch home from work. Its basically tag board.

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  13. I love making them! We use posterboard and then add glue lines on top for details. I set up 6 stations around the room that have two colors each. They look best when the colors start mixing and " ghost" colors from the previous station add to the new. I like to print them on black paper.

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