YEAR OF THE SNAKE

  

woodblock  print 5 x 7 inches

This is my 12th year of cutting and printing a woodcut for the Baren Chinese New Year's Exchange.    34 of my prints are sent out and I have received a few already.   I began doing the exchange in 2002, the Year of the Horse and this year I have completed the 12 year cycle.

I have been so into painting lately and it was hard to change gears and make the print.  And the subject wasn't appealing at all.... I hate snakes.   But once I got into it, I enjoyed it.  

I used three blocks..... the yellow and green were done with the same  shina wood block, and another shina block was cut for the red.  I used linoleum for the black (key block).

I printed the yellow block and then the red block.

And here the green printing which was a reduction of the yellow block to just the numbers..

 I printed about 50 usable prints, mostly on BFK, a few on shin torinoko.  I used some chinese tube watercolor,  sumi ink and methyl cellulose and printed with a baren.

The snake is a coral snake.