The Beauty of Printmaking

9961202_orig
9961202_orig
Today, Printmaking is used as an art technique in which you etch a design on a piece of wood, stone, or other material and are able to transfer that design onto a piece of paper.  It is used for more than just making art pieces, however.  For example, it is used to make the design for every dollar bill in America.
    The first etching ever found (and possibly created) was during the Ice Age on bones and cave walls.  Duplicating an etching was not actually used until around 3000 BCE by the Sumerians.  Only stone cylinders were used back then, but more and more materials were being used as time went on and by many different cultures.  Like how wood was first used by the Japanese back in 764 CE.  Techniques of making Printmaking have also branched off to make unique styles.  Such techniques as Relief, Lithographing, Intaglio, etc.  Printmaking may be used mainly just for art nowadays, but it was, in fact, a revolutionary technique used by scholars, scientists, and designers alike. The reason it was so revolutionary, was because it was the first method ever that allowed people to copy a design/information that someone's created, without having to make/write it all over again.
    Printmaking allows such works as the one above to be made.  I notice how by using the contrast of the Black and White, it gives the owl such a shadowy and creepy feel.  The shadowy characteristic may also be thanks to how he/she used White as the outlining, and Black to fill in the negative space.  I wonder what I would feel if the colors reversed.  Would I still feel the creepiness of the menacing Black eyes?  What if it was a different animal? Would I feel a different emotion if it was a squirrel, even if he/she used the same method?

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