Silkscreening

Katie D.

August 21, 2009 - 5:45 PM

I just finished a week-long intensive silkscreening class at the UO Craft Center. Silkscreening, if you don't know, is a kind of printing process. The process is relatively versatile and can be used for cards and posters. But the main attraction of silkscreening (for me) is that you can print your own t-shirts. Basically any picture or emblem can be transferred onto basically any clothing item.

The class was three hours a day for five days. Each day was a marathon: learning new techniques, coming up with designs, learning to use the screens and inks, and printing out projects. We were a small group: just five people packing as much creativity as possible into that week.

I'm a pretty creative type, although I have little or no skill in the drawing/painting/traditional visual arts department. But I love crafts and abstract arts like that. I've previously taken two classes at the Craft Center and been impressed each time. During my sophomore year I took a glass beads class that I truly enjoyed. Working with hot glass is a bit like working with silly putty: you stretch it and smear it and try really hard not to make a mess because that stuff is HOT. Then you have something beautiful after it's had a chance to cool (here the silly putty analogy has ended).

The other class I took was freshman year. You know that joke about sending your kid to college to learn underwater basket weaving? Well, I have yet to take my projects underwater, but I did learn to weave baskets. As silly as it sounds, it was actually one of my favorite college moments when I finished that basket. I'm very, very proud of it. That being said, I will not be switching to a fiber arts major, nor do I plan to take on too many wickerworks projects in the coming year.

Honestly, the Craft Center was a big draw for me at the UO. It's an amazing place. You can learn to make wooden drums or blow glass or do ceramics, photography, sewing, felting, metalworking... Anyway, I've taken advantage of the classes offered there when I've had the time. And I'm always glad I did.

Today was the last day of the class, and I was a woman on a mission. The first three days of class I was printing on paper, using various techniques to design and print pictures. Yesterday I moved on to shirts. I designed and printed three t-shirts, and had an amazing time doing them. I had promised to make t-shirts for two of my roommates for their graduation gifts. Finally, just a couple of months late, I delivered. Please check out the picture. The back of the shirts read "Floppy Sleeves and the Tea Kettlers" If you haven't heard of us already, I'll fill you in: that's the name of our fake band. All we've got are three members with pseudonyms and a single set of lyrics. It was the joke of the house this year, and now it's been memorialized on shirts. As I've said, I'm really very proud of how the shirts turned out: they were a multi-step process since I was printing in two color sets and on both front and back.

Today, though, was the main event. I made five t-shirts. They are (nerd alert!) Battlestar Galactica t-shirts for me and four friends. Now, while I am quite fond of the design, the real point of pride here was the execution of the shirts. I was working on black shirts with white ink. For whatever reason, white ink is notoriously hard to work with and dries really quickly, so I had to work fast. This translated to me printing furiously, dashing around to place the finished shirts for drying, and having a fantastic time. There's something magical about racing to actualize something you created. I love seeing a project move from the first idea to the finished product.

I have tons of plans for future shirts. I promised my dad some band t-shirts and will be working with him on the design soon. Since I made shirts for the old roommates, I've got to make some for the new household, once we've built up sufficient inside jokes for fodder. Then there are all the gift-giving occasions you can imagine, with infinite potential for shirts, sweatpants, and bandannas. I've already started collecting some older shirts to turn into "new and improved" fashion statements. Watching the other students in my class as they created their shirts was quite the inspiration: there is so much potential that arises in a class like this.

Who knows how I'll use this later? For now I've got a couple of amazing shirts for me, plus some belated gifts. Time do some more designing, plus I've got to head to Goodwill or someplace to get some cheap shirts to improve. Projects galore!