Steamroller Printing with Pickwick Independent Press

Two days before our big steamroller printing extravaganza, I had a mad rush in the studio to finish carving my block of MDF. The whole block was designed on the fly directly on the block. I had no idea what to do on the outside of the "knobby donut" so I decided triangular rays would be striking for a public event, and a simple way of fading from white at the edge of the form to black at the edge of the block.

The grey part is acrylic paint used to seal the parts of the block that hold the ink. MDF is so porous that it will just soak up the printing ink, so this makes it so oil-based ink rolled onto the block will sit on the surface.
This past Saturday we set up on Oak Street at about 4pm, and started printing at 6pm as part of the Block Party organized by Space Gallery. We made 15-20 large prints using a steamroller to press canvas onto inked blocks. The response from the audience was amazing, and they applauded at the revealing of each print.

I was on the inking team so I was considered "dirty handed", which meant I couldn't touch any clean canvas. I ended up completely covered in nasty oil-based ink.
On Sunday, the day after the Block Party, we set up in a nearby parking lot to print the rest of an edition of three of each print. Sponsors to the event get one good print, the artists get one, and Pickwick Independent Press gets one. We were there for 9 good hours printing away, doing some on muslin.

I had decided the night before that I wasn't going to be an inker. I had to wash my whole body with vegetable oil and scrub in the bathtub for a good long time and I decided I was going to be "clean hands" on Sunday. But as soon as I got to the parking lot, I picked up a previously inked block and got all messy so I was like, "F#ck it, I'm an inker today".

The three closest prints below are by Cat Jensen, Delphine Sherin, and Erin Leon:
These left to right are by Abigail Swartz, Corliss Chastain, and Josh Eckels:
These are by Cassie Jones, Sage Lewis, and me- Clint "Super Mario" Fulkerson:

And here's a closer shot of my print:
To see more about this event, check out these links:

Lisa Pixley's Post, article on liveworkportland.org with an image of my print, article in the Portland Press Herald, Kyle Bryant's blog kylebryantart.blogspot.com, and Abigail Swartz's blog tiptoethrough.blogspot.com

I'll post links to videos as they're published. There were several people filming but I haven't seen anything out yet.