In the late 1960's my ever creative father decided he wanted to design and carve a wood block print as our family Christmas card. He did this for about 3 or 4 years in a row. One of his designs was a paisley with the word
Christmas Is Love carved inside. It was a two color ink print on colored construction paper. Rather than carving out part of the design, printing one color and then carving out the rest of the design and printing as you would in a reductive block print, he carved two separate blocks for each color. I wish I had an example of his finished product but fortunately my sister reprised his design for her Christmas card in 2010. Using dad's wood block carvings, she printed pink and turquoise inks on white paper for the retro look shown below. I seem to remember dad using all different colors of papers and inks.
Recently inspired by my sisters card I've taken up linocut printmaking and decided to do a Christmas card of my own this year. In the photos below I have drawn the design on the linoleum, carved it and printed it in Phthalo Blue relief ink. I sent out roughly 50 hand pressed cards.
It was quite a bit of work but the best feedback and gift I received as a result is that my Aunt told me that my Uncle, who has Alzheimer's like my father did, holds the card everyday and stares at it.
