5 Collagraph: Inspiration, ideas + test plates

Before brainstorming and working on a concept for my resolved collagraph work, I wanted to look into the textural possibilities in the selection of various materials I could used to make my collagraph plates and test print to see the tonal variation I could achieve through material, ink application and wiping back techniques. I created a series of test plates from a variety of gathered materials: UHT cartons, recycled card, found plant material and eucalyptus bark. I created the below plates at home to allow plenty of time to dry before bringing in to shellac and print (Some plates not pictured).

Eucalyptus leaves with UHT carton

Created using an old UHT Bonsoy carton, scratching into the surface with a drypoint needle and peeling back some of the plastic to expose raw paper texture. After cutting this, I realised it would likely be too flimsy to hold up in the process so decided not to test print it. I’ll have a play around with this method in a later project.

Paper leaf

I cut a eucalyptus leaf shape out of watercolour paper and used a hand embossing tool the emboss lines/venation, then coated with a matte medium.

Beeswax on card

As an experiment in creating texture from an organic material, I used some natural beeswax kept from a used candle and rubbed it on card. As it layered up the wax started forming little bumps that more wax would cling to.

Glue and plant material

For this test plate, I painted on some PVA first, let it part dry, then scratched into the glue to add some lines and texture before letting it fully set. I then glued down a pulverised leaf I found on the footpath.

Gluing other plant material to card with glue painting/texture behind.

Bark

Some foraged pieces of bark collected on walks glued to card for stabilisation. After getting some really nice embossing/blind emboss in my mono prints, I wanted to test it out in my collagraph experiments too.