Studio visit by Laura Charlton – Risograph Hack

We met with Laura Charlton to print her work for the Drums on Paper, Risograph Print Show November 7. As you may know by now, the prints will be an edition of 10. Laura wanted to create unique prints with the Risograph, meaning that all 10 prints from her edition are unique. In order to accomplish this with a Risograph, we experimented mounting a smaller paper to the maximum paper size of the RP3700 risograph (11″x17″). This mounting approach allowed Laura to rotate the sheets in different ways to create unique prints with one single master and multiple passes. So in a way, she hacked the Risograph with her experimental approach.

Laura Charlton is a New York based artist with a background in printmaking. Her most recent work uses random photographic images culled from various common sources (makeup tutorials on Youtube, cat videos, car ads from the New Yorker and 80s horror movies) as an access point to study collective representations. A photograph of a thing becomes a thing. The credibility of a photograph as representation of reality begins to break down as it passes through the printing process. The photographic image dissolves into interference, shifting from collective representation to unrepresented particles. These are some of the thoughts that guide her research. 
Her work incorporates various digital and analogue printmaking processes including silkscreen, intaglio, inkjet, collagraph, and solvent transfer (and now Risograph!)