Occasionally I enjoy working on monotypes in between painting watercolor or collages. I studied and experimented with printmaking techniques in the early 90s, both monotypes and woodcuts. My inspiration is flowers and in the spring and summer I draw my garden varieties from life, saving the sketches for later. This design is one of my irises.

I begin by placing the drawing under a sheet of glass, the same size as the paper I will be printing on. The Arches 88 archival printmaking paper is taped to my table alongside the glass, so it stays in registration while printing. I use a water sprayer to dampen the paper, which accepts the acrylic pigments, and the result is a soft, painterly effect. This is what I am striving for, and this result is very different from my cut paper collages or the loosely painted watercolors. I have experimented with different printmaking papers to change the results but still give the painterly effect.

Many pigments were used to blend for the flower: titanium white, purple, blue, magenta, violet, green, orange and crimson. I paint each shape directly on the glass, flipping the damp paper over the painted shapes and rub that section — printing on the paper. It is the additive approach, painting small sections at a time; this is important because flipping a large, damp paper is awkward at best. After the painting is completely dry, I mount it on a Crescent Perfect Mount board which is archival and adds support to the printmaking paper and keeps it flat.