DESCRIPTION 2010 Calendar: An experiment in printing CLIENT Marin Santic DATE December 2009 DESIGN CREDITS Marin Santic PRINT CREDITS Academy of Fine Arts and Design - Ljubljana

QUANTITY PRODUCED 15 PRODUCTION COST €15 ($20) PRODUCTION TIME 1 month DIMENSIONS: WIDTH × HEIGHT × DEPTH 70.7 cm (27.83 in) × 100 cm (39.37 in) PRINT METHOD Lithography PAPER STOCK Fabriano paper NUMBER OF COLORS 1 spot ink

While we rarely post student work on FPO (given its production limitations and realities), when we do there is a good reason for it. Marin Santic is a soon to graduate student at the Academy of Fine Arts and Design in Ljubljana, and he likes to experiment and learn by getting down and dirty with his design. For this particular calendar he wanted to understand what lithography was all about from a DIY point of view.

My professor Junos Miklavc explained the process to me. Ink on stone, followed by acid to carve areas for ink, and at the end water and oiled color for the print. I have a great interest in calligraphy, which combined with my love for handwritten letters led to the final design. Once I had the elements of the design ready for production, I used a black and white photocopier to print them—I then cut them up and placed them on the printing stone. I transferred the ink from the black and white copy to the stone using nitro diluent. Finally, I acid etched the inked parts creating areas for the ink that created the impression on the paper.

No small feat for a single pair of hands, but surely a great way of understanding how the process works as well as its capabilities and limitations.