Samantha Faber Pursues Passion for Printmaking at Small Craft Advisory
from FSU Art BA 20 Samantha Faber:
This semester I’ve had the amazing opportunity of interning at Small Craft Advisory Press. SCAP is a print shop run through FSU that produces collaborative artist books. Sadly, the physical work was cut short by a global pandemic, but I hope to continue helping press managers, Art Professor Denise Bookwalter and SCAP Press Manager Jay Fox, virtually from home. I have always loved art and design but I never felt I fit perfectly into any category. I took an intro to printmaking class on a whim because I needed to fill extra credit hours and I absolutely fell in love. The thing I love most about printmaking is that there are so many ways to use it as a tool in art and design.
A lot of people say printmaking is just the old school way of printing something with an inkjet printer. I cannot express how wrong those people are. Printmaking is SO different. There is a very different quality to a print pulled off a printing press. The physicality of setting type and manually applying ink to the rollers to create text or an image is what part of what drew me to printmaking. I was so excited to intern at SCAP because I was able to be even more immersed in the world of letterpress, screen, and relief printing. I went into my time at SCAP with a working understanding of different types of printmaking and some knowledge of book binding. I was intimidated at first because I knew I would be working with tools and processes I had never used before, but a week in and I was helping cover book covers and assembling a giant moebius strip. I was only physically there for 9 weeks, but looking back at that time I was involved with so many things. The coolest part about the internship was being able to have a hand in creating real art. The artists books I helped print and assemble were the real deal- something a group of artists had spent months and sometimes years on. To know I was part of the team working the production side of these major projects was a little mind blowing.
The only struggles I had were the learning curves for each project. There were many “crash courses” on how to do specific things. Covering boxes was the toughest thing I learned how to do and I respect any artist, printmaker, and book binder who chooses to complete their project with a handmade box. I would TOTALLY recommend this internship to any printmaking or graphic design student. As someone who is following a career in graphic design, printmaking has helped me grow as a designer and artist. Learning the “old way” is so important for understanding design elements and why thorough planning is such a big part of graphic design
