Printmaking has enjoyed a colorful history as a fine art, with methods that encompass woodcuts, engraving, etching, mezzotint, aquatint, drypoint, lithography, screen-printing, digital printing and foil imaging. But what makes it colorful is, of course, the ink.
Ancient Ink
A cave painting using ground limestone and water.
No one knows the name of the Paleolithic artist who ground up hematite with animal bone, stirred it with water, urine or blood, and airbrushed a negative image of his hand on the Roucadour cave wall in France 28,000 years ago, or that of his successor who captured the image of a horse and rider in calcite (lime white) on another wall.
We do know the name of the artist credited with inventing ink in 2736 BC: Tien-Lcheu, a Chinese philosopher. He mixed pine smoke soot and lamp oil, thickened with gelatin from animal skins and musk, ,writes Sharon J. Huntington in "The Christian Science Monitor." By 1200 BC, this ink was in common usage.
Medieval Times
Egyptians, Greeks, Romans and Hebrews crushed berries, barks, plants and minerals to mix with liquid as a bonding agent. Around 300 AD, the Chinese devised an ink formed into a solid stick or cake. The user shaved off the needed amount, ground it with a stone and mixed it with water, forming what's known as India ink.
Renaissance and Beyond
A Puerto Rican postage stamp featuring a Durer print.
As printmaking evolved during the Northern Renaissance (1430-1580), inks became more varied and complex in composition, even adding precious metals like gold and silver. Today's inks are a complex medium of solvents, pigments, dyes, resins, lubricants, solubilizers, surfactants and fluorescers.
