The Art of Woodcuts

The Baltimore Museum of Art is presenting an exhibition October, 2000 entitled "Book Arts in the Age of Dürer," featuring book illustrations from the Renaissance period. The museum states, "Lovers of fine books will delight in this exhibition of northern European woodcut illustrations... Books by German master printmaker Albrecht Dürer are joined with 15th- and 16th-century illustrated books about astronomy, medicine, music, travel, geography, classical history, and mythology." Knowledge of the subject matter can foster a deeper appreciation for the artists and their work. This article will give an overview of the form of printmaking known as the woodcut.

Printmaking is a distinct art form wherein multiple copies of an image are made from one source, whether a stone or plate or block. Each of the copies, or prints, is considered an original piece of artwork. This is not to be confused with the often-used "print" that refers to a virtually worthless copy or reprint of a famous or desirable oil painting or drawing. Often when a gallery visitor is done perusing the galleries and wants a remembrance of a favorite work of art, she will buy one of these reproductions at a museum shop.

In printmaking, the artist oversees and is involved in each step of the process, from conception of the drawing, to the cutting or preparation of the plate or block, to inking and preparing the surface for printing, to actual pressing, or "pulling," of the print from its block or plate. Then each print in the run, or edition, of this specific printing is numbered, i.e., the first print completed in an edition of 50 will be numbered 1/50, the second 2/50, and so forth.

The beauty of printmaking is that many identical images can be made from the same block or plate. Woodcuts are the earliest, simplest, and the most enduring of printmaking processes, in constant use for centuries as a way of disseminating ideas to a wide audience. Prints are a relatively fragile art form, as they are produced on paper, but with proper care and due to a resurgence of popular interest can become quite valuable.

There are four forms of printmaking that will be explored in future articles here:

• planographic (such as lithography)
• intaglio (etching and engraving)
• stencil (serigraphy and silk-screen printing)
• relief (woodcut and linocut)

Process

Woodcuts adhere to the venerable traditions of relief prints, wherein raised areas of a wood block hold the ink and make a mark against the paper when it is rubbed or pressed against the block. An everyday example is the rubber stamp. The technique is quite simple: the artist scores or draws an image on a block of wood, uses sharp tools to cut away the areas of the design that will not print, and leaves the raised shapes that will print. Although no special tools are required, generally the artist uses sharp knives, gouges, and "V" tools to cut away the wood.

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