Gelli Arts® Monoprinting Plates

I few months ago I saw this cool YouTube® video where a mixed media artist was using gelli plate to form some pretty cool prints to use on her art journal and I though it was a great tool and set out to look for it on the internet.  To my delight there is a website for it and is called Gelli Arts® (click here for link).  It comes in 4 sizes; 8” Round ($28), 6” by 6” Square ($20), 8” by 10” Square ($30) and 12” by 14” Square Plate ($70).

I really love this product and have been having a messy blast making all kinds of prints.  The web site gives you all the information you need on how to work with this plates and how to take care of it. A few useful tidbits of information:

• Do not throw away the plastic container it comes in since it is great to store the Gelli Arts® plate in.  I keep mine in the container and hanging on my pegboard in my office/studio.
• Have a good soft rubber brayer to spread the paint on the plate.  I use Speedball® 6” brayer because it covers more surface.  I bought the hard rubber but it left too many lines of paint and I did not like the way the paint spread.  But that is my personal choice it might work better for you.
• Have in hand a bottle spray filled with water and a roll of paper towels for in between printing cleaning.
• Use Acrylic paints since they are easier to work with.  I use Reeve’s® brand but many people I have seen use Golden® and I even found that those 2 for $1 acrylic paint bottles work just great because they are thinner and spread on the plate easily. 
• I clean my plate after I finish using with some mild soap and water and I pat the plate with paper towels.  Don’t use any aggressive cleaners or sponges since the surface of the plate is sensitive to them.  You can end up leaving marks on the plate that will show over and over on any future print you make whether you like or not. 
• Make sure to read Gelli Arts® Downloadable file on instructions and care.  This way you can get the best of your money and save yourself any aggravations.  The link is http://www.gelliarts.com/pages/what-to-know.

The great thing about it is that you never know what you are going to get exactly until that print is lifted.  When it comes to papers I have found that stock card paper works pretty well.  I have, however used craft paper and a really cool paper to use is Dixie Kabnet Dry Wax Paper (link: HERE) in 12 in by 10 3/4 in. sheets.  I got them at Amazon and it came two boxes for a total of a 1000 sheets.  Imagine a thousand prints!!!  at it was around $25 for the two boxes.  I like using this paper because is can be semi-translucent and it is great to add texture to journal pages.  The paint sticks to it and the prints come out great, it can be torn into pieces and is better than tissue paper, which I do not recommend at all. Messy business! Here are some of my try out results:

For these I used the deli paper:

The basic technique is to place you plate on a craft sheet to protect your surface since the Gelli Arts® plates are made of some mineral oil. Then take out your paints and place a small drop of paint (a drop of paint can go a long way) and spread with the brayer.  You can drop a few drops of different colors and spread them to form all kind of interesting combinations. 

To add texture you can use stencils, ribbons, lace, and with just simply a Q-tip® form shapes and texture. The idea is to simply draw a design or texture to print on your paper. I like to use texture plates and once you lay them on the gelli plate they make an impression that then transfers to the paper.  The possibilities are endless.  I found YouTube® and the Gelli Arts® website to have a lot of information and tutorials on how to use these plates which is better than my rambling on. If you can, try it.  You’ll love it, and is really addicting.

From a soul looking for inspiration to another, have a Great Day!!!
wonderingmindfield