A monotype is a one-of-a-kind work of art.
Spontaneous and unpredictable, this form of printmaking involves creating an image on a smooth, un-etched metal or plexiglas plate and then transferring that image onto paper by placing moistened paper over the plate and rolling them both through a printing press. The pressure of the press causes most of the ink to be absorbed into the paper, leaving the plate nearly clean and the image unrepeatable. Unlike other types of art prints, therefore, a monotype cannot be sold in editions.
Many people ask what the difference is between a monotype and a monoprint, which is a good question, as the terms are often incorrectly used interchangeably.
A monoprint, which can be sold in an edition, is an etching (a print produced from a plate with an image permanently incised into it) that has been hand-finished. For example, an artist might make an etching of a landscape, print an edition of 100 and hand finish them all with oil, watercolor or gouache paint. As with anything hand-finished, there would be differences from print to print (hence the prefix “mono”), but because the overall image would have been repeated, they would not be wholly unique.
A monotype is wholly unique because the image cannot be repeated. For this type of print, the plate and press are used not for duplication, but simply as tools that imbue the finished work with a texture and quality of light that would not be achievable if the ink were applied directly to paper or canvas.
