HONOLULU PRINTMAKERS INTAGLIO INVERTEBRATES CLASS - JULY 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 2026

A wonderful class that sparked my creativity to learn a new art form, aquatint, took place at the Honolulu Printmakers, every day for one week. Artist and Wicked Bugs and Wicked Plants illustrator Briony Morrow-Cribbs guided us through copperplate etching and airbrush aquatint (with an automized mist of acrylic) to create tonal gradient intaglio prints. Briony (and her husband Abe) from a small town of 2,000 was the visiting professor from Dummerston, Vermont. The theme was to create copper plate designs with native Hawaiian insect images. The first day of class took us on a tour of the University of Hawai`i Insect Museum.

We returned to the beautiful Mililani Street Honolulu Printmakers studio where we applied hardground to our 6" x 9" copper plates, rolled it up and baked it for 15 minutes, then we drew our insects and etched the copper plate for 20 to 30 minutes. We prepped the plate by degreasing it with Bon Amy and Shoyu Sauce. Then the interesting part of Airbrush Spraying Painting with acrylic aquatint back and forth, up and down, sideways to sideways, and then diagonal to diagonal to create a fine dot pattern on the copper plate by spraying an even fine mist. We then baked it in a box with a hairdryer. Briony directed to stop out anything we wanted to remain white and etch for 9 seconds for 10% gray, rinse, deoxidize by degreasing the plate in a vinegar solution, rinsed, and dried. the next step was to stop out anything that we wanted 10% gray; we etched it again for 9 seconds for 20% gray, rinsed and deoxidized in in the vinegar solution. After many more stop outs and repeated processes, we used a tarlatan cloth (a starched cheese cloth) to wipe off the intaglio black ink from the surface of our copper plates leaving the ink in the recessed lines of the etched image. The plate was then placed on the bed of the press with dampened paper on top. And then rolling around and around the press rollers we applied heavy pressure to transfer the ink and fine lined design from the plate on to the pater. and then printed on the press. And voilà an insect print came to life.

It was a very enjoyable class that everyone seemed to have success with their intaglio insect prints. Thank you, Briony for the wonderful class, Denise, for organizing the class, Leslie for boarding Briony and Abe, and Kiara for being the most fabulous assistant.

Briony and Abe seemed happy to be in Hawai`i and we were happy that they came across the county and our blue Pacific Ocean to share her talents and Aquatint art form. Mahalo and Aloha Briony.