Screen Printing

This quick and easy screen printing class gets students running out their own screen prints within minutes. The teach-operated screen printing station lets students observe peer work as it’s unveiled from under the screen.

Context

This activity was conducted in studioFive at MGSE as part of our Master of Teaching course.

Themes

  • Mapping
  • Identity
  • Position and perspectives

Skills and Techniques

  • Screen printing
  • Stencil cutting
  • Colour mixing

Media

  • Cartridge paper
  • Tissue paper
  • Acrylic paint

Task

Students refer to their Lino Printing or Mapping Country pieces as a starting point for this exercise. They extend and expand upon their existing work and apply their thinking to this print.

Provide the class with tissue paper to draw and cut designs from. Invite students to fold and cut the lightweight paper, and observe the kinds of symmetrical shapes they are able to form.

Once students are ready, set up a printing station in the room and ask students to bring their completed stencils to the station. Students can mix acrylic paints to their desired colour, before helping each other print at the print station.

Encourage discussion around the prints as they are coming out from the screens, asking students about the techniques they used in preparing their stencils and in executing the screen print.

Art Connections

Students are invited to play with positive and negative space in bringing their mapping work into screen prints. Collaboration in printing helps students build comprehensive understandings of the process and allows them to observe different ways of approaching the same task.

VCD Connections

Tissue paper screen printing is an extremely fast way for students to print graphic designs on to paper and other materials. This exercise can be used within the design development and refinement stages of a project as a way of exploring concepts and working towards a final design solution.

Related Artists

Benjamin Rider

Dogboy

Next Steps

Following lessons can extend these concepts by:

  • Once dry, secondary screen print designs may be prepared and printed over the top.
  • Map drawing or painting can be revisited on the completed screen prints.
  • Students can use their screen print skills to develop posters around issues that have come out of their Mapping Country experience.
  • The screen prints can be scanned into Photoshop and Illustrator. By adjusting scale, colour and contrast, students can move the work towards a logo or graphic design.