Learning Curve

I recently got major Gocco envy. Gocco is a silkscreen set up that lots of folks, arty and otherwise, use for small projects. Evidently, they're easy to use and take up a small amount of space when set up. They were produced in Japan starting in the 70's and the market there was saturated with these things. After folks starting producing home graphics on their computers, the market fell off. Well, Gocco has caught on in the U.S., and these little machines are highly sought after here. Unfortunately, the company who manufactures them has long since gone in another direction and is no long interested in continuing to produce them. You can still find a Gocco to purchase, but supplies are going to be more difficult to find as time goes on.

So, I put in a search for the next best thing, and I think I have found it. PhotoEZ is cheaper than Gocco as well as being much lower tech. I bought everything I needed to start up for well under $100.

Producing the silkscreen itself was much less difficult than what I remembered from my college printmaking class. Basically, you put the original art work on the stencil film and set it out in the sun. Then you soak the film, wash it off, and print with it.

Trying to reinvent the wheel, I made a frame to hold the stencil and even made a vacuum table (out of a flower pot...window screen...and a vacuum cleaner....snicker). Quite the contraptions, but they served only to complicate a process that was intended to be simple. I abandoned them when they created new problems and did not alleviate the old ones.

Here's an overview of my travels up the learning curve:

I'm not "there" yet, but I'm getting there. I'm beginning to get excited about the possibilities.