Josie’s River Print

Josie rolls a thin layer of blue paint across a smooth printing tile. She wants a winding white river through it. With a cotton bud, she lifts a narrow line of paint from one corner towards the other.

Sam helps lower a sheet of paper onto the tile. Josie rubs gently, then peels it away. The river has changed sides. The bend she drew on the left is on the right of the print. “It went the wrong way,” she says.

Ms Brook holds the print beside the tile. They are facing each other, like two hands pressed together and opened. Josie traces the bend in the air. The print is a reversal of her first drawing, not a different river.

She tries another tile, this time planning the river the other way round. Before using paint, she folds a scrap of paper and compares the two halves. Sam makes a small pointing gesture to remind her where the bend should start.

The new print turns the way Josie expected, but one corner is faint. She had rubbed mostly in the middle. On the next attempt, she smooths gently across the whole sheet, keeping it still so the edges do not slide.

A tiny smudge appears near the riverbank. Josie considers starting again. Sam says it looks like a tree leaning over the water. She turns the print and studies the mark. It gives the wide empty bank a place for the eye to stop.

They lay the prints in order, from the unexpected reversal to the clear winding river. Josie chooses the one with the smudge for the display. Underneath, she places a second print so viewers can see that every pull from the tile is different.

As the prints dry, Josie cleans the tile ready for someone else. She has a plan for the next river, but she does not want to decide every mark in advance. Part of the pleasure is waiting to see what lifts onto the paper.