Exposing Screens
Today was the day that I finally decided to jump back into the print room. Me and the print room have a complex relationship, it is rather a love-hate kind of thing most of the time. However, today I changed the rut I was in and finally decided it was time to start printing for the first time this semester. Embarrassing I know considering I am creating a final collection.
To be completely honest, I thought the whole thing would be a disaster. From picking up my traces, I realised that most of the images I chose to put on my screen were pixelated or had a strange dotty texture to them. On the other hand, I do think this is in fact a very happy accident since I was trying to achieve a street art kind of effect with the screen-printing elements.
The dotty and pixelated effects help the screen prints to look like they have been sprayed on and have an irregularity to them. The dotty texture is also seen within the white spaces, but again looks like excess off a spray paint can. I like this effect, even though it wasn’t planned.
My favourite designs have to be the family images that I exposed onto my screen, especially the one of my grandad in the corner. This image just reminds me of the street art of Che Guevara and the iconic stencil of his face across Marxist revolutions in South America. In a way I am using my grandad’s image to demonstrate how other immigrants like him, have positively impacted this country and contributed to the UK’s culture. He could potentially even be seen as a revolutionary promoting multiculturalism in the UK as an original immigrant.
My other favourite elements on the screen have to include the different postage stamp sizes. This incorporates my branding style into my designs and makes my designs and branding come together and be concise. The only thing concerning me about these screens are the size and the scale of the images. In relation to my context of fashion, does this scale really suit fashion prints and to be worn on the body as well.
If I was to do this again, I think I would chose to reprint and expose my Brick Lane drawing design again in order to achieve crisp and defined lines. For now, my screens do the job just fine and really do (unintentionally) play into the graffiti and screen art style that my project includes.
