I have never really connected with Lino printing before. The technique reminds me of Year 10 Textile lessons and accidentally slicing my finger open with the Lino cutter (trust me, its easier to do than you think!)

My Lino print is inspired by my Alhambra drawing which you can find here. I couldn’t make the Lino stamp itself as detailed as my initial painting because my carving skills aren’t up to par unfortunately, but I was still able to make a somewhat substantial stamp.

My initial idea for this print was to create a design that looked somewhat distressed and worn away in areas. I thought this would emulate the stone effects that the brief called for and would give added texture to it too. I started with just using a minimal amount of ink and rolling that thinly on my Lino stamp. This did give the distressed effect I was looking for, but also felt very 2D. I decided to add different shades of the same blue colour on top to give a more 3D effect and it worked!

Not only did I investigate using this stamp on paper, but also fabric too. Printing onto fabric automatically gave it a more 3D effect due to the different textures of the weave or the materials used.

To further my samples even further, I combined my appliqué technique (of which, you can find here) with my printed fabric. I used any scraps of leftover fabric I had in the same shades to embellish and add the 3D elements that this brief was looking for. As a result, I ended up with a 3D (ish) looking sample.

There is so much more that I want to do with this project! It is a little infuriating that the print room isn’t open, so I can’t do all that I want to with this project for now. But, as the saying goes, it is always better to be safe than sorry.