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This lino print design is based on the Native American indigenous people’s legendary and supernatural ‘Haida Thunderbird’. The thunderbird represents power, protection and strength and is said to create thunder by flapping it’s wings and lightening by flashing it’s eyes (Wikipedia, 2022). I love traditional artwork and stories of legendary, mythological and/or supernatural creatures from across the world and I’ve wanted to try a Haida thunderbird design out for quite sometime. I chose lino print as a medium as it lends itself to the solid shapes found in the style of some of the visual art of the indigenous people of the Americas. I have screen printed over collage before and created some great results (and happy accidents) and I wanted to try this out while printing the lino. It took a while to cut the lino out and I was pleased I just did one half of the design! Here are the results…
I had already prepared a collage of really old scraps of paper (which I found having a good clear out) over good quality paper and added a bit of watered down acrylic paint to get rid of and tone down some large areas of white. After leaving it to completely dry I inked up the lino and gave it ago…
I was pleased with the results and with the help of Photoshop I could also see what it would look like as a complete thunder bird:
There were some areas of the lino print over collage and acrylic that caught my eye, happy accidents, which gave me ideas for some experimental landscape work. I’ll save that for another blog.
Gillian Hebblewhite 