Chapter 1 - 6

06 Art History

Lithograph

Lithograph is a truly unique printmaking technique.

Unlike other methods that had a long legacy of practice before their modern adaptation, lithography is a fairly new way of printing.

It was discovered in the 1790s by a young German actor and playwright named Alois Senefelder.

Senefelder was an aspiring artist in Munich, but was unable to get any of his plays published by the larger printing presses of the time.

In an effort to make a name for himself, he attempted to reproduce the plays that he wrote independently.

Originally, Senefelder approached the problem traditionally.

Printmaking techniques of the time involved carving out areas of a copper plate and leaving behind raised areas.

These raised areas would then have ink smeared across them.

Inked plates would be set on a paper to make a print.

Senefelder was too poor to purchase copper plates, however, so instead he used large sheets of limestone that lined the streets of Munich.

One day, Senefelder’s laundress arrived at his studio to pick up his laundry.

He quickly wrote his laundry list on a limestone plate with crayon made of wax, soap, and a black pigment.

Afterwards, he placed the limestone in acid and discovered that the laundry list he had written with the crayon appeared in relief on the stone plate.

The waxy crayon material protected the limestone underneath it from being dissolved by the acid.

In this way, acid and wax crayons could be used to produce printing plates.

This discovery provided the foundation for lithography, which would develop into a new artistic medium.

Eventually, the process of creating a relief on the surface of the plate stopped.

The process was altered so that the printing surface instead remained flat.

Essentially, an artist marks a limestone or aluminium plate with a greasy substance–typically, a crayon made of wax or soap.

The plate is then treated in a light acid bath, which helps fix the image on the plate and keep it from smearing.

After the acid bath, the plate is soaked in water.

The area of the plate not drawn on with the crayon soaks up the water, while the greasy areas repel the water and keep it from soaking into the plate.

Upon removal from the water, the plate is then inked, whereby a light layer of ink is brushed across the plate.

The portions of the plate saturated in water repel the ink, while the greased portions of the plate soak up the ink.

When the inked plate is put on a piece of paper, the water-soaked areas contain no ink and make no image.

Meanwhile, the greased portions soaked with ink print the page.

Although the plate is flat, ink only sticks to the greased sections.

As a result, the greased area becomes in imprinted on a page.

As it developed, the possibilities that lithography had were realized almost immediately.

Printers could create a number of interesting effects relatively easily.

Compared to carving a plate to do the printing, an image could simply be drawn onto a plate, which would be treated in acid and water and then inked.

It was significantly cheaper and less labor-intensive than other printmaking techniques.

Moreover, a number of artists effects were made available with this new lithographic process.

By putting particular colors in the grease crayon used to draw the image on the plate, new colors besides that of the ink could be added to the image.

Furthermore, by adjusting the concentration of certain components in the grease crayon, the amount of ink taken by plate could be manipulated.

Needless to say, the process of lithography changed printmaking entirely.

It made images more readily available to the public, thanks to the cost of production.

In addition, lithography allowed one to manipulate the tone and concentration of ink on an image, which was impossible using other printmaking methods.

It quickly grew in popularity and was used to print books and posters.

A number of European and American artists were quick to adapt the technique to their artistic vision as well.

Without a doubt, Henri de Toulouse-Leutrec was the most famous artist to use lithographs.

Typically using lithography to create advertising posters, Laurence’s style was well-suited to the printing technique.

Lautrec’s images draw one’s eye toward the poster and attract attention.

Over the course of less than 100 years, the lithographic process had become streamlined and widely popular.

Besides creating a new artistic medium, it also made prints more widely available to the public and allowed them to have art in their homes.