The Serigraphic Process

The silk screening process emerged and received wide acceptance for fine art prints in the 1940s and 1950s. In this method, viscous silkscreen ink is forced through a nylon screen, depositing the ink on the paper. A separate screen is required for each color. The process of serigraphy is a more modern, mechanized version of traditional silk screening, allowing for faster runs of excellent color quality and sharpness of image.

"Up until that time [1969] I had tried etching and lithography, but found myself repeatedly turning to monoprints. When I finally took a crack at silkscreen, I discovered straight away that it was just right for my way of applying paint. The silkscreen process places no limitations on color possibilities, just as in painting. When doing silkscreens, I commence by laying on an abstract underpainting, establishing unresolved color temperatures, intensities and tones. Then, working into the disorganized paint, color by color, color over color, images slowly start taking shape. As the colors are laid down, a certain turbulence is retained which gives my serigraphs their special energy."

"To experience a silkscreen fully, the viewer need only look and then respond to the initial impact. In viewing a silkscreen, the process itself is visible. The spectator can take the same route, making his or her own discoveries, just as I do as I'm giving shape to the existing confusion of color. Getting it right can only be achieved with a required discipline and exactness. That's where the fun comes in. Decisions and changes are constantly being made while establishing the structure, the space and the form. Fluidity of movement, in a word, painterly."

- LeRoy Neiman

Neiman's serigraphs are organic extensions of his paintings. His earlier experiments with lithographs and monotypes in the 1950s and 1960s prepared him for the serigraphic technique that he began to use in 1970.

Neiman works very closely with the masterprinter and the chromist in the execution of these prints. Often, as many as 36 oil-based colors must be orchestrated into that symphony of tones that is the final work of art.

It is a delight to Neiman that the character of the serigraph media enables him to achieve the same dynamic look and feel that his paintings have. And it is a joy to Neiman collectors that they can actually feel the sensuous texture of the paint as it has been applied to the custom-made, 100% rag, French paper.