RMW Ramblings

  Cards of Christmas Past Stenciled Cards Not all of our cards were printed. For several of them I did a simple line drawing on cardstock and cut away the lines with an Exacto knife to make a stencil. I then drew the images on the cards with a pen through the stencil.   Here's a holiday horn, drawn on construction paper...   I wrote the text by hand on the inside...     On another construction paper card, I used a stencil for an Earth globe Christmas ball, then sketched in the stars freehand... Stenciling and writing text by hand made it easy to do variations, so not everyone had to get an identical card. The next card went out in green, blue, and red versions, with a different one word message for each.  We had fun picking the version which we felt was most appropriate for the recipient...   In the next posting we'll look at some other cards that did not involve printing. 

  Cards of Christmas Past A Magus on Camel The magus (wise man) on camel back returns here against a pattern of stars morphing into palms.  Printed by Xerox copier.  An exercise in graphic design.

      In 1979 the Wise Men or Magi were arriving on our card.  Printed from one screen with different inks, staggered, in three printings displaced for effect.

  Cards of Christmas Past 1978 Art Deco Clouds For our 1978 card I didn't print from a linoleum block or with a "silk" screen.  In fact, I didn't hand print them at all. I drew the card design in ink and printed them with a Xerox copier, then hand painted them in watercolor individually.  The drawings and my text were done in an art deco style.  The quote is from the Book of Isaiah.  Many of the themes and quotes on our early Christmas Cards were directly from, or influenced by, the libretto of Handel's The Messiah, which drew extensively on Isaiah.  For a few years in the 1960s I was a participant in Wilmington's Capella Chorus, and performed  The Messiah annually.   That oratorio is still an important part of the Christmas season for me.   Here's the front of the card... And here's the inside...  Again the cards were printed on one side of the paper and folded in thirds.  Our family monogram star and the date were on the bac...

  Cards of Christmas Past Everywhere Another screen print from the 1970's, this time two printings for the front and the inside with different inks.  Here''s the front...     And here, in a different ink, is the inside...   I like the heavier ink print with some dimensional texture from screen printing.

  Cards of Christmas Past Awake!   For Christmas 1974 I again did a serigraphic print.  Above is the front of the card.  Inside is a more elaborate scene.   The card was printed all on one side of standard 8½ x 11 inch cardstock.  Then by folding the card in thirds the mountain sunrise becomes the inside of the card.  it then fits a standard #10 envelope. Here's the full sheet, unfolded... The center section becomes the back of the card.  It has the year and a version of our family monogram star.  You can see, it could be folded to make the mountain scene the front and the dove the inside.  

  Cards of Christmas Past The Magi In 1966 we were now living in Wilmington and I was still printing with linoleum block cuts. This card, no longer monochrome, was printed in four stampings. Multiple printing steps and multiple colors. The three magi were printed with the same linocut with different inks, phthalo blue, phthalo green, and (the middle figure) a blend. The star was printed with  a separate small linoleum block.   Here's the magus printing block...     Earlier, our 1964 linocut card was still printed in a single color but I added some golden rays with a pen...     With this text inside, the printing block reversed here for readability...    About the same time, I began printing a family monogram on the envelope flap for the card mailing...    We'll be transitioning to serigraphic printed cards next.