Posted on 1st October 20162nd October 2016 by karencropper

Images from the successful castprinting workshop September 2016

We were fortunate to have the pleasure of Jon George sharing his expertise and castprinting technique in the workshop at the gallery 24-28 September. All the places were taken up and everyone enjoyed themselves and worked hard.

This post has photos from the workshop. I’ve included at the end a list of all of the equipment and materials needed for this process. It isn’t a full explanation of the process, but just intended as a reminder for if we run the course again or any people who attended. And the photos are roughly in the order of the process except for the prints that I have included next to their glass painting or cast block for comparison purposes. Clicking on any image will enlarge it and allow you to scroll through the set as a slideshow.

Some of the items needed laid out at the start of day one

Jon explaining what the technique can produce in his own work

Demonstrating the first step of preparing gesso and painting on to glass

Mixing gesso

A hive of creative activity in the gallery

Glass painted with image by Bill Swan

Printed image by Bill Swann

Plaster cast blocks just after pouring

Washing off the plaster cast to remove clay and gesso

Inking up the roller

Laying on the paper

Rolling the paper on to the inked block

Peeling off the paper to reveal the image

Glass painted with gesso by Ann Hickebottom

Inked plaster block by Ann Hickebottom

Print by Ann Hickebottom

‘Baranyini’, hand-castprint 50×56 cm (20.5″x23″) copyright Jon George

For this printing process you need:

Ingredients for gesso – chalk and a water soluble binder
A small water bottle with suitable lid for allowing small drops of water
A piece of glass to paint your image on, bigger than the image you want to make
A smaller piece of glass or tile to mix the gesso on
Another piece of glass to roll out your ink on at the printing stage
4 pieces of wood the same thickness, bigger than the image you wish to make
Palette knife (knives) to mix your gesso
Paint brushes to paint your image with gesso
A handful of clay to seal the wood on to your glass as a frame to then pour plaster into
Plaster
A bucket to mix the plaster in
2 cups – one to measure the dry plaster the other to measure water – preferrably with handles
A wet area for washing off plaster from any buckets and cups and washing the gesso of the plaster cast
Ink
Paper
White spirit or turps (to clean off the oil based ink)
Rollers for the ink and for pressing the paper on to the cast block
Lots of cloths and newspaper for cleaning up

Future plans

Jon George is working on a book about his work, life and the castprinting process. We hope that he will be able to return to the gallery next year and run some more workshops on this technique and also painting with egg tempera. If you are interested in any of these things, please contact us (if you are not already on the mailing list for updates) or check back on this website regularly.

Photographs by Karen Cropper and Bernard Young.

Posted on 28th September 201619th August 2016 by karencropper

Day 4 Castprinting workshop with Jon George

Attending all 4 sessions takes you through the process of the three basic stages of Castprinting:

Making artwork on a plate of glass.
From the artwork a plaster block is cast.
Print impressions are then taken from the block.

This session will be dedicated to: Printing from the plaster block made in the previous session

For full details of what is involved in the technique and a video of past workshop, please read more here.

If you are not available for all four sessions but are interested, please do come to what you can to see the process in action.

This is one of four two-hour workshops. The price for all four is £65, including £5 for materials. An individual workshop is £15.

Posted on 27th September 201619th August 2016 by karencropper

Day 3 Castprinting workshop with Jon George

Attending all 4 sessions takes you through the process of the three basic stages of Castprinting:

Making artwork on a plate of glass.
From the artwork a plaster block is cast.
Print impressions are then taken from the block.

This session will be dedicated to: Making a plaster block from the artwork made in the previous 2 sessions

For full details of what is involved in the technique and a video of past workshop, please read more here.

If you are not available for all four sessions but are interested, please do come to what you can to see the process in action.

This is one of four two-hour workshops. The price for all four is £65, including £5 for materials. An individual workshop is £15.

Posted on 26th September 201619th August 2016 by karencropper

Day 2 Castprinting workshop with Jon George

Attending all 4 sessions takes you through the process of the three basic stages of Castprinting:

Making artwork on a plate of glass.
From the artwork a plaster block is cast.
Print impressions are then taken from the block.

This session will be dedicated to: Making artwork on a plate of glass

For full details of what is involved in the technique and a video of past workshop, please read more here.

If you are not available for all four sessions but are interested, please do come to what you can to see the process in action.

This is one of four two-hour workshops. The price for all four is £65, including £5 for materials. An individual workshop is £15.

Posted on 24th September 201619th August 2016 by karencropper

Day 1 Castprinting workshop with Jon George

Attending all 4 sessions takes you through the process of the three basic stages of Castprinting:

Making artwork on a plate of glass.
From the artwork a plaster block is cast.
Print impressions are then taken from the block.

This session will be dedicated to: Making artwork on a plate of glass

For full details of what is involved in the technique and a video of past workshop, please read more here.

If you are not available for all four sessions but are interested, please do come to what you can to see the process in action.

This is one of four two-hour workshops. The price for all four is £65, including £5 for materials. An individual workshop is £15.

Posted on 4th September 201619th August 2016 by karencropper

Paintings and Prints by Jon George

The exhibition will be of paintings and prints by Jon George, some scenes local to the gallery (such as the Bath House, Barmouth seen below).

The exhibition will be open 11am to 4:30pm every day (except Mondays when closed). The private view for this exhibition is at 7:30pm on Saturday 3rd September.

About the artist

Jon George was born in 1944 in Barrow-in-Furness, a shipbuilding town in Cumbria. He studied fine art at Falmouth 1965-68 specialising in painting, following his own wish to refer increasingly to landscape and other aspects of the seen world. Jon says:

“I questioned the place and purpose of art and its contribution to society and in this respect became interested in printmaking for its socialistic values.”

Later he developed his own kind of block-printing method, which he calls Castprinting. Jon is running a workshop at the gallery on how to do Castprinting (see separate post).

In 1980 Jon was a founder member of a group of artists who took over an old factory in East London to convert it into studios by their own hands, and they are still there today.

Artist’s statement

As a landscape painter I recognize that I am in pursuit of beauty and believe that, in itself, this is worthy enough an object in my art. However, alongside this is another need to observe truthfully those things, due to human activity, that disturb the beauty and constantly threaten it. So my art aims to take both elements to create a balanced view of reality. The act of being in the natural environment and spending time drawing it in the field is crucial to my belief. Between seeing and the drawn rendering of pencil to paper comes a personal, poetic change due to interpretation, which is not self conscious.

My paint media of choice is egg tempera, which I took up when needing a quick drying paint but it proved to be much more than that – delicate, subtle, and translucent with colour so pure. Again from the drawings to the making of paintings or prints in the studio come another contemplation and the application of colour and ideas, which is now conscious and inventive.

More information about Jon George: www.jongeorgeartist.co.uk

Posted on 18th August 201619th August 2016 by karencropper

Learn Unique Castprinting Technique from Artist Jon George

We have the exciting opportunity to learn from Jon George about his Castprinting technique in a workshop running over four afternoons (24th-28th September not including Sunday) at the gallery. The workshop will be along the lines of the workshops he runs regularly from his London studio.

The Castprinting Technique

Castprinting is a new block printing method, which Jon developed when wanting to ‘reinvent woodcut with brushes.’ In most relief printing methods the image is carved in the block. However, in the Castprint block it is derived from painting – not cutting.

The three basic stages of Castprinting are:

Making artwork on a plate of glass.
From the artwork a plaster block is cast.
Print impressions are then taken from the block.

In our case the timetable is 2-5pm each day, as follows:

Saturday 24th and Monday 26th Sept will be making the artwork on the plate of glass.
Tuesday 27th Sept artwork to plaster block.
Wednesday 28th Sept print impressions from the block.

Character of Castprinting

Castprinting is a successful form of printing. People of all kinds love its simplicity and find working with gesso as a painting medium appealing. While the final results in the print faithfully render the brushwork in surprising and unusual ways. Castprints share those qualities expected of block printing, such as solid deposits of ink and colour that one wants to touch.

It has a tonal quality

Due to a subtlety of relief depth in the Castprint block, a wide variety of ink deposit creates the equivalent of tonal variation in the final print. This is new to relief printing.

Mirror imaging is solved

A typical relief print produces a mirror image, as it has but two phases A-B. But the three phases of Castprint: painting, casting and printing make it an A-B-A process and so the print emerges right-handed.

It is a viable printing method

The hard plaster of the printing blocks, make them capable of producing any number of prints.

The workshop will be fun and can be experimental

Castprinting courses are always interesting and challenging and different groups have brought new approaches leading to innovations. An example of this was with some art students in Morocco who insisted on using toothbrushes to flick the gesso to get a textural half tone effect. Jon said it probably would not work – but it did and their work was lovely.

Workshop fees, materials and equipment.

The cost of the full course is £60 plus £5 for materials which will be provided. It would be best to try to come to all 4 sessions to have the chance to see and try out all steps in the process and produce your own art work with the technique. But if you are only able to come to one the cost is £15 for each plus materials used. Please wear appropriate clothing for getting messy.

Here is a video about the technique, of a workshop at Jon’s London studio. This workshop will be taking place at St John’s Hall Gallery Barmouth, which is a different set up.

About Jon George

Jon’s exhibition of paintings and prints can be seen at the gallery 4th-30th September.

More information about Jon George: http://jongeorgeartist.co.uk/

Vine print — ‘Vine’, photo-castprint 57x68cm (23″x27″) copyright Jon George

St John's Hall Gallery

Tag: castprinting