I’m happy to unveil my new print, a happy addition to my current exploration of “Wind-up Birds.” This isn’t the first time I’ve used watercolors in printmaking, but it is the first time each version will be a little different with a slightly different color combination. Here, you can follow the progress of my print in pictures.

I decided to use resingrave for the print. Resingrave is an enameled surface that’s hard to carve, but yields great fine details. The hardest part of the drawing was figuring out the way the gears, which are visible in the bird’s chest, should look.

The first print was too dark, I think because I’m still a little timid working in this medium. I also needed to clean up the white space where the crow is standing.

Next, the print run! It went pretty well. This was the first time I used my little letterpress printer to make a resingrave print, and I have to say it went perfectly smoothly.

I had to recreate the border of the image, but other than that, I felt it needed only a little correcting with an ink pen. The fun part was painting the watercolor stripes. I’m experimenting with different combinations.

You can check these out in my Etsy shop!