Having joined Cato Press, Bristol in April I have begun experimenting collagraph printmaking, both intaglio and relief.  I began with an ambitious piece, a 50cm circle with a variety of shaped and textures, and a number of smaller studies for this piece.

I wanted use text but cutting this by hand is tedious so I used my Cameo vinyl cutter, cutting card and vinyl.

Using a vinyl cutter for vinyl is quite simple (as the name suggests) but for paper and card requires more trial and error.

Card can vary in density quite a lot, some paper is hard on the cutter blade due to the high chalk content.  The prints here (not great pics) are quite pale but that suits the subject.

There is no text on this study, just hand-cut shapes.   Something to aspire to, here is a rather more advance image by Suzie MacKenzie.