Lithography ~ (invented in 1798 by Aloys Senefelder)  This form of printmaking is based on the simple physical law that oil and water will not mix. Lithography is a planographic medium. The stone or plate from which the print is made is completely flat. The artist uses a greasy drawing material to make an image on this surface; the surface is then chemically treated so that only the drawn image will accept the printing ink. The undrawn areas of the stone (by virtue of the same etch) will accept water. The non-image area must be kept damp with water while rolling ink onto the image area (drawing) in order to yield identical impressions. Although the solution used for this is called an “etch”, its effect is not to bite into the stone (as in an etching made on a zinc plate), but only to separate chemically the image and non-image areas.

What you will learn:
1. The physical preparation of a litho stone including leveling and graining.
2. Traditional and non-traditional dry and wet drawing techniques for use in stone lithography.
3. The basic, chemical principles behind stone lithography and stone processing for printing