Chinese carved wood characters.

In a Hongkong second hand shop, not far from our Hotel, I found this little tray of 30 Chinese characters. I tried printing them first with block stamp ink then I inked up with black letterpress ink and placed them in a galley to make a good print for identification. My Uncle, Bob Chartres, has a friend who is an expert in old Chinese Characters so I hope to find out the meaning of these.

Chinese characters (30)

I used the Hunters Proof Press, circa 1900, to print these characters onto incisioni using a heavy felt blanket and a 'green' oil based letterpress ink.

Mad Bull Proof Print

This print was printed on incisioni 190 gsm, dampened, with Carbon black Akua ink. I wiped the edge of the plate first with a piece of telephone book paper. Some of the noise in the print was made with the uneven edge of the cardboard squeegee. I should have cut the card with a guillotine.

Jane Adson's intaglio solarplate

Using an iceblock stick makes it easy to stir the jar of Akua waterbased intaglio ink then place a dob of ink onto the solarplate ready for the squeegee. As the ink does not dry in the air but dries in the paper its printed onto, extra ink can always be scraped off and put back into the jar.

Jane's plate

Lay down the ink onto the plate.

Inking plate

The squeegee lays down the ink both ways.

Inking Jane's plate

Using a piece of mat board as a squeegee the surplus ink can be scraped off before wiping.