Short courses from the Centre for Print Research Spring 2024

Author ripleywk | Posted on

The Centre for Print Research (CFPR) offers a series of dynamic continuing professional development courses (CPD) aimed at a wide audience including artists, designers, craftspeople, communicators, photographers, teachers and managers. CPD courses offer the opportunity for professional updating, learning new skills and techniques, and for intellectual stimulus.

CFPR is a research centre within UWE Bristol. It has links and partnerships with world leading academic institutions; an outstanding track record in working with industry; working collaboratively with high profile artists, studios, contemporary makers and galleries.

Our courses for 2024 are being finalised please see the details below. More courses will be added over time so please check the course list website for up to date details.

Let’s Lino Workshop – 19 & 20 March

This course is Lino Printing 101. It will give an overview of the whole lino printing process, including drawing designs, transferring designs onto lino blocks, carving and printing. There are many methods of printing to explore: single colour, multiple block, reduction lino printing: the possibilities are endless and importantly, very exciting.
This course will enable any beginner to understand the fundamentals of lino cutting, mark making and translating images into print. It will equip you with skills and techniques needed to continue making your own prints at home.

This course is ideally suited to printmakers, artists, illustrators, and anyone interested in print with little to no previous experience. The course is perfect for beginners wanting to get to know the basics, but is also suited to more experienced printmakers looking to pick up new tips.

Advanced Tetra Pak Printmaking – 25 & 26 March

With its layers of paperboard, polyethylene and aluminium foil, Tetra Pak not only has an immediacy which other collagraph materials lack, but also a satisfying tactility when cutting, scoring, peeling and printing with this distinctive material. During this advanced two-day Tetra Pak collagraph print workshop, the course tutor, Stephen Fowler, will facilitate the exploration of multi tetra pak plate prints which explore colour overlay, and the combination of intaglio and relief collagraph print processes.

This course is ideally suited to for artists, educators, printmakers, and illustrators who have some experience in collagraph printmaking, or have attended one Stephens previous Tetra Pak printmaking courses before.

Introduction to Rubber Stamping – 27 March

Nearly everyone has the means of rubber stamp production in their pencil case: an eraser, scalpel, pencil and maybe even a stamp pad, all that’s needed is something to print on. When choosing an eraser the common misconception is ‘the bigger the better’ but this is an error. Unlike linocut printing and other forms of relief printing, it isn’t purely a means of reproducing a motif, picture or design.
During the workshop you will learn how to carve and print stamps. You will leave with a number of stamps, prints and a limited edition publication containing the groups stamp print impressions. 

This course is ideally suited to for artists, educators, printmakers and illustrators who have some or no experience printmaking.

Screenprinting Beginners Workshop – 11 April

The beginners workshop is perfect for people who have little or no experience screenprinting. It’s a chance to learn about the history of screenprinting, learn various techniques – from artworking to coating your own screen, but most importantly to have fun, get inky and engage with the printing process.
Participants of the course will leave with their own hand printed artwork. They will also have a good understanding of the process of screenprinting which would give them the confidence to return for future workshops, or to enter any print room and know what to do.

The beginners workshop is perfect for people who have little or no experience screenprinting.

Collage Book College – 16 & 17 April

The word Collage derives from the French ‘to glue’ and has an ancient history dating back to the invention of paper in China in about 200 BC. Look around and you will see Collage everywhere and so perhaps it is a way of responding to, and trying to make sense of, a very fractured and disconnected world.

In book arts we can use collage to unite disparate elements to create something new and whole in it’s own terms, in either very controlled or in free-flowing organic ways. Over two days we will try many different collage techniques relating to words, images, magazines,
pictures, books, cutting, pasting, stitching, splicing and creating.

This practical course will give participants the time and space needed to make collages and collaged books that they may not have otherwise produced. Some projects may involve group collaborations. Some projects can be one-off pieces, others could be small editions. The course will be structured but it will also be exciting and spontaneous, responding to the desires of the participants.

This course is ideally suited to Book Arts practitioners, students, professional artists, amateur artists, and book-makers, seeking to learn completely new skills, or to brush up/develop existing ones and to then proceed to working on their own projects once the course has finished

Prinitng on silk

Introduction to Photopolymer Gravure Printing – 18 & 19 April

 In this two day course Laura will provide an introduction to Photopolymer Gravure plate making and printing. The course will allow participants to expose, develop and print their own plate using imagery they have bought with them, be it a drawing or a photograph. Once the plate has been made, they will learn how to print their plate, and leave with a beautiful original print of their own making.

Participants of the course will leave with their own hand printed artwork. They will also have a good understanding of the process of photopolymer gravure which would give them the confidence to return for future workshops, or to enter any print room and know what to do.

This course is aimed at those with very little experience but want to learn about Photopolymer Gravure and gain some experience printing Intaglio.

Introduction to Tissue Transfer Ceramic Printing – 24 & 25 April

This is a new two day course delivered by Dr Lisa Sheppy who has just completed her PhD at the CFPR with an investigation into tissue transfer printmaking for artists. This method of ceramic print production was an industrial process and practiced in the potteries and has now been made accessible through research conducted at the CFPR by Lisa.

This process has never been fully explored as an art process, and for this course Lisa has pared it down into three straight forward stages of production. Initially you will making your own design using digital technology to create a unique printing plate. You will then use your plate to print intaglio onto tissue and transfer onto a ceramic substrate. The ceramic will then be fired and glazed ready for you to have your own piece of tissue transfer printed ceramic.

This course is suited for artists who are intermediate level printmakers with some knowledge of intaglio printmaking. You do not need to have any ceramics background.

Introduction to Analogue Black and White Photography – 27 & 28 April

In this workshop, participants will explore analogue black and white photography as a fine art print process, by exploring the use of 35mm film camera photography and darkroom printing.

This course will re-engage the participants with traditional film photography and maybe even with the cameras they have forgotten about or inherited from their families. It is as much an introduction to analogue photography for newcomers as well as a refresher for lapsed photographers wanting to return to darkroom days of years gone by.

The Black & White Print- 30 April – 1 May

On this 2-day course the participants will learn how to produce prints from black and white negatives. Understand the workings of a darkroom and the safe handling, preparation and use of chemistry needed to develop black & white prints. Develop an understanding of the creative and visual potential of black and white photography and master the techniques used to produce stunning prints. This includes an understanding on the effect of contrast control on image tone, the effect of exposure on image brightness, burning and dodging, to produce well exposed and correctly balanced black and white prints.

This course would refresh the skills and knowledge of participants who may have already used a darkroom to produce black and white prints and up skill participants who have used black and white film and analogue cameras but have used commercial Labs to make prints in the past. The understanding and mastering of analogue B&W printing is a transferable skill which will be of use of participants who already print digitally. The course will use a medium format analogue film camera but if learners have an analogue film camera then by all means bring it along.

Liquid Light: Working with Light Sensitive Photographic Emulsion – 13 & 14 May

This workshop will explore the different ways light sensitive photographic emulsion can be used to make dry-glass plate negatives, false tintypes, and black and white prints on a variety of substrates such as paper, fabric and stone. After an introduction to the process and its variations, participants will learn to prepare and coat a glass or aluminium plate and to expose these in a camera. We will then develop the images as a negative or a positive, ready to be printed from on the next day.

This course is aimed at confident photographers who would like to push the boundaries and explore black and white image making using a new approach and is suitable for confident beginners and advanced photographers.

Sculpted by the Machine – An Introduction to Creative CNC Programming – 14 – 16 May

This course is an introduction to custom and creative programming of a 3 axis CNC milling machine/router. Throughout the course, we will explore the essential tools, encompassing both machines and cutters, explore the intricacies of the necessary software, and demystify the G-code that governs these machines. We will explore a non-traditional workflow that enables those with even basic skill levels in digital fabrication to design for the process in an out-of-the-box wy.

Emphasising a holistic approach, this course uniquely integrates analogue techniques with digital precision, guiding participants to craft a final object that embodies the synergy between traditional craftsmanship and cutting-edge CNC technology.
Unlike traditional courses that focus on industry standards for machining engineered objects, our approach encourages play and collaboration with the machine.

This course is designed for creative educators (academic and technical) and practitioners in art, design, and architecture.

Screenprinting Intermediate Workshop – 15 – 17 May

This three day short course will allow participants to gain an in-depth understanding of Screen Print, from the history of screen printing, art working, printing your own film positive, to coating your own screen, and printing onto paper and fabric with multiple colours.

Participants of the course will leave with their own hand printed artwork. They will also have a good understanding of the process of screenprinting which would give them the confidence to return for future workshops, or to enter any print room and know what to do.

The intermediate workshop is perfect for people who have some experience of Screen Printing, or for people who have an understanding but maybe haven’t printed in a while.

Afghan Box Camera Workshop – 22 May

The Afghan Box Camera is a camera and darkroom in one, and can produce black and white portraits anywhere! Predominantly used in Afghanistan to make identity images as well as formal portraits at weddings and for special occasions, the camera is a versatile tool for the photographic image maker anywhere lacking a traditional darkroom!

This course is aimed at anyone with an interest in photography

Concessionary rate prices: CFPR offer a 20% discounted concessionary rate to UWE Bristol staff, alumni (including previous CFPR CPD attendees), anyone reliant on state benefits for their income, anyone currently in full-time education (worldwide) or part-time higher education (UK), and those who are retired.

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