Intaglio (printmaking)

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Intaglio (printmaking)

Intaglio (pronounced in-TAL-yo, ) is a family of printmaking

Printmaking

Printmaking is the process of making artworks by printing, normally on paper. Except in the case of monotyping, the process is capable of producing multiples of the same piece, which is called a 'print....
techniques in which the image is incised into a surface, known as the matrix or plate. Normally, copper

Copper

Copper is a chemical element with the symbol Cu and atomic number 29.It is a ductile metal with very high thermal and electrical conductivity....
or zinc

Zinc

Zinc is a metallic chemical element with the symbol Zn and atomic number 30. It is a first-row transition metal of the group 12 element of the periodic table....
plates are used as a surface, and the incisions are created by etching

Etching

Etching is the process of using strong acid or mordant to cut into the unprotected parts of a metal surface to create a design in intaglio in the metal ....
, engraving

Engraving

Engraving is the practice of incising a design onto a hard, usually flat surface, by cutting grooves into it. The result may be a decorated object in itself, as when silver, gold, steel, or glass engraving are engraved, or may provide an intaglio printing plate, of copper or another metal, for printing images on paper as prints or illustra...
, drypoint

Drypoint

Drypoint is a printmaking technique of the intaglio family, in which an image is incised into a plate with a hard-pointed "needle" of sharp metal or diamond point....
, aquatint

Aquatint

Aquatint is an intaglio printmaking technique, a variant of etching.Intaglio printmaking makes marks on the matrix that are capable of holding ink....
or mezzotint

Mezzotint

Mezzotint is a printmaking process of the intaglio family, technically a drypoint method. It was the first Grayscale to be used, enabling half-tones to be produced without using line or dot based techniques like hatching, cross-hatching or stipple....
. Collographs

Collography

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Encyclopedia

Intaglio (pronounced in-TAL-yo, ) is a family of printmaking

Printmaking

Copper

Copper is a chemical element with the symbol Cu and atomic number 29.It is a ductile metal with very high thermal and electrical conductivity....
or zinc

Zinc

Etching

Etching is the process of using strong acid or mordant to cut into the unprotected parts of a metal surface to create a design in intaglio in the metal ....
, engraving

Engraving

Drypoint

Drypoint is a printmaking technique of the intaglio family, in which an image is incised into a plate with a hard-pointed "needle" of sharp metal or diamond point....
, aquatint

Aquatint

Aquatint is an intaglio printmaking technique, a variant of etching.Intaglio printmaking makes marks on the matrix that are capable of holding ink....
or mezzotint

Mezzotint

Collography

Collagraph is a printmaking process in which materials are applied to a rigid misspelling collograph. .The plate can be intaglio inked, inked with a roller or paintbrush, or some combination thereof....
may also be printed as intaglio plates. To print an intaglio plate, ink is applied to the surface and then rubbed with tarlatan cloth to remove most of the excess. The final smooth wipe is often done with newspaper or old public phone book pages, leaving ink only in the incisions. A damp piece of paper is placed on top and the plate and paper are run through a printing press that, through pressure, transfers the ink from the recesses of the plate to the paper.

Intaglio techniques are often combined on a plate. For example Rembrandt

Rembrandt

Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn was a Netherlands Painting and etching. He is generally considered one of the greatest painters and printmakers in European art history and the most important in History of the Netherlands....
's prints are referred to as "etchings" for convenience, but very often they have engraving and drypoint

Drypoint

Drypoint is a printmaking technique of the intaglio family, in which an image is incised into a plate with a hard-pointed "needle" of sharp metal or diamond point....
work as well, and sometimes no actual etching at all.

Apart from intaglio, the other traditional families, or groups of printmaking

Printmaking

Relief print
Relief print

A relief print is an image created by a printmaking process, such as woodcut, where the areas of the matrix that are to show printed black are on the original surface; the parts of the matrix that are to be blank having been cut away, or otherwise removed....
s, including woodcut
Woodcut

Woodcut - formally known as Xylography - is a relief printing artistic technique in printmaking in which an image is carved into the surface of a block of wood, with the printing parts remaining level with the surface while the non-printing parts are removed, typically with gouges....
, where the matrix is cut away to leave the image-making part on the original surface. The matrix is then just inked and printed; not wiped as described above.

Planographic, including lithography
Lithography

Lithography is a method for printing using a stone or a metal plate with a completely smooth surface. By contrast, in intaglio a plate is engraving, etching or mezzotint to make cavities to contain the printing ink, and in woodblock printing and letterpress ink is applied to the raised surfaces of letters or images....
, where the image rests on the surface of the matrix, which can therefore often be re-used.

Other families have developed, especially in the twentieth century - see printmaking
Printmaking

Printmaking is the process of making artworks by printing, normally on paper. Except in the case of monotyping, the process is capable of producing multiples of the same piece, which is called a 'print....
.

Both intaglio and relief, as well as planographic printing processes, print a reversed image (a mirror-image of the matrix), which must be allowed for in the composition, especially if it includes text.

Procedure

Brief history

See old master print
Old master print

An old master print is a work of art produced by a printing process within the Western tradition . A date of about 1830 is usually taken as marking the end of the period whose prints are covered by this term....
for the history of engraving to 1830,

See also line engraving
Line engraving

Line engraving is a term for engraving images printed on paper to be used as Old master print or illustrations. The term is now much less used and when is, it is mainly in connection with 18th or 19th century commercial illustrations for magazines and books, or reproductions of paintings....
, mostly on nineteenth-century engraving,

Intaglio engraving, as a method of making prints, was invented in Germany by the 1430s, well after the woodcut

Woodcut

Woodcut - formally known as Xylography - is a relief printing artistic technique in printmaking in which an image is carved into the surface of a block of wood, with the printing parts remaining level with the surface while the non-printing parts are removed, typically with gouges....
print. Engraving had been used by goldsmith

Goldsmith

A goldsmith is a metalworker who specializes in working with gold and other precious metals. Since ancient times the techniques of a Goldsmith have evolved very little in order to produce items of jewelry of quality standards....
s to decorate metalwork, including armour, musical instruments and religious objects since ancient times, and the niello

Niello

Niello is a black metallic alloy of sulfur, copper, silver, and usually lead, used as an inlay on engraved metal. It can be used for filling in designs cut from metal....
technique, which involved rubbing an alloy into the lines to give a contrasting colour, also goes back to late antiquity. It has been suggested that goldsmiths began to print impressions of their work to record the design, and that printmaking developed from that.

Martin Schongauer

Martin Schongauer

Martin Schongauer was a Germans engraver and Painting. He was the most important German printmaker before Albrecht D?rer.His prints were circulated widely and Schongauer was known in Italy by the names, Bel Martino and Martino d'Anversa....
was one of the earliest known artists to exploit the copper-engraving technique, and Albrecht Dürer

Albrecht Dürer

'Albrecht D?rer' was a Germans Painting, printmaker and theorist from Nuremberg. His still-famous works include the Apocalypse woodcuts, commons:Image:Duerer - Ritter, Tod und Teufel .jpg , St....
is one of the most famous intaglio artists. Italian and Netherlandish engraving began slightly after the Germans, but were well developed by 1500. Drypoint

Drypoint

Drypoint is a printmaking technique of the intaglio family, in which an image is incised into a plate with a hard-pointed "needle" of sharp metal or diamond point....
and etching were also German inventions of the fifteenth century, probably by the Housebook Master and Daniel Hopfer

Daniel Hopfer

Daniel Hopfer was a Germany artist who is widely believed to have been the first to use etching in printmaking, at the end of the fifteenth century....
respectively. The golden age of artists engraving was 1450-1550, after which the technique lost ground to etching as a medium for artists, although engravings continued to be produced in huge numbers until after the invention of photography

Photography

Photography is the process, activity and art of creating still or moving by recording radiation on a sensitive medium, such as a photographic film, or an ....
. Today intaglio engraving is largely used for currency, banknotes, passports and occasionally for high-value postage stamps. The appearance of engraving is sometimes mimicked for items such as wedding invitations by producing an embossment around lettering printed by another process (such as lithography

Lithography

Lithography is a method for printing using a stone or a metal plate with a completely smooth surface. By contrast, in intaglio a plate is engraving, etching or mezzotint to make cavities to contain the printing ink, and in woodblock printing and letterpress ink is applied to the raised surfaces of letters or images....
or offset

Offset printing

Offset printing is a commonly used printing technique where the inked image is transferred from a plate to a rubber blanket, then to the printing surface....
) to suggest the edges of an engraving plate.

Plates are usually made from copper or zinc.
Formerly used extensively for high quality magazines, fabrics and wall papers.
Common uses still include some postage stamps and paper currency, at one time used for all mass-printed materials including bank notes, stock certificates, etc.