Experimental Monotype Printmaking Course
with Francesco Geronazzo
Experimental Monotype Printmaking Course with Francesco Geronazzo
Explore the unique potential of monotype, push the boundaries of process, and elevate your artistic practice.
This course is taught by internationally recognised printmaker Francesco Geronazzo. It is an invitation to embark on a creative journey through experimental monotype printmaking, exploring the expressive, material, and conceptual possibilities of this singular print process.
View Francesco’s work here and learn more about Margaret River Printmaking here.
Designed for artists at different stages of their practice, the course focuses on developing confidence in both conceptual decision-making and hands-on making. Francesco will guide you through approaches to generating ideas, working intuitively with ink and surface, and responding to chance within the printing process. As the course progresses, you will refine your understanding of monotype as a contemporary practice, strengthen your visual language, and gain practical strategies for sustaining an engaged and reflective printmaking practice.
“For me, printmaking is about staying curious, exploring the process deeply with discipline, openness, and a willingness to keep learning. Curiosity opens possibilities, while discipline allows the work to reach its full potential. Printmaking becomes a way to connect to land, memory, and experience through direct, physical engagement with materials. After the first print, that’s where the real work begins, responding, adding, and allowing the process to evolve beyond tradition. I approach teaching in the same way: not by telling people what to do, but by sharing passion and authenticity, because that’s what truly inspires learning.”
Francesco Geronazzo
COURSE STRUCTURE
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Begin the course with an introduction to Francesco Geronazzo and his approach to monotype printmaking as an expressive and experimental practice. In this section, Francesco:
introduces monotype within the wider field of printmaking,
discusses the materials used throughout the course including papers, inks, plates and tools,
explains how to set up a printing press
explains how to work safely in printmaking studio contexts.
You will also be guided through recommended books and resources and introduced to influential and contemporary artists from printmaking and related disciplines whose practices offer broader creative and conceptual inspiration.
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In the second part of the course, Francesco:
demonstrates a wide range of monotype techniques, showing how the process can be adapted to different subjects and approaches.
Through practical demonstrations, you will explore monotype applications across portraiture, landscape, birds, and natural forms such as rocks,
while learning how to use a variety of tools for mark making, layering, and tonal variation.
Francesco shares insights into working intuitively with image and surface, responding to the plate as the work develops, and building confidence in experimentation as a core part of monotype practice.
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In the third part of the course, Francesco:
reviews completed prints and reflects on the outcomes of the monotype process.
This section focuses on assessing works by analysing what has worked well and identifying lessons that can inform the continued development of a series of prints.
You will also explore different ways of presenting and displaying finished works, alongside constructive approaches to reusing less successful prints through collage, book or journal covers, and other creative applications, encouraging a flexible, reflective, and sustainable approach to printmaking practice.
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In the fourth section of the course, Francesco:
shares insights into developing an authentic artistic voice.
reflects on the balance between conceptual thinking and technical skill,
the role of play, intuition, and chance,
how materials and processes can actively shape the work.
Drawing on key turning points in his own practice, Francesco:
discusses his artistic journey and the lessons learned along the way.
This section also explores what gives work meaning for both artist and viewer, concluding with practical insights to support printmakers in building a confident and evolving practice.
Have your questions answered in two live Q&As with Francesco Geronazzo
Dates TBA
Meet Francesco Geronazzo
Francesco Geronazzo is an Italian-born printmaker and artist based in Margaret River, Western Australia, whose practice bridges traditional printmaking with contemporary experimentation. With a lifelong dedication to printmaking that began in his teenage years, Francesco has developed a body of work deeply informed by process, materiality, walking, memory, and place.
Francesco trained extensively at the Academy of Fine Arts in Bologna, where he completed six years of printmaking studies under a range of influential teachers, engaging with both classical and experimental approaches. His education was further enriched through international experiences, including a seven-month assistantship in Porto, Portugal, with master printmaker Graciela Machado, and advanced studies in Spain with leading artists and lithography specialists. In 2010, he co-founded Officina de la Stampa in Bologna, a printmaking studio dedicated to education and contemporary practice.
Since relocating to Australia in 2013, Francesco’s work has evolved through a sustained engagement with the Australian landscape. His widely recognised project Connecting with the Land transforms bushwalking into what he terms “quiet performances,” using metal plates attached to his boots to record movement, terrain, and duration directly onto printing surfaces. These works reflect an ongoing dialogue between body, land, and mark-making, shaped by his experience as both an immigrant and an attentive observer of place.
Materiality plays a central role in Francesco’s practice. Alongside pristine cotton papers, he frequently works with found and archival materials, such as maps, documents, notebooks, and discarded papers, valuing their existing histories and traces of lived experience. His more recent works expand printmaking into mixed media, fabric, thread, and sculptural forms, challenging conventional boundaries of the medium. Through projects such as Surroundings and Ink and Thread, including a three-year collaboration with DADAA, Francesco explores connection, community, and the physical act of leaving a mark.
Francesco is the founder of Margaret River Printmaking, an international studio and platform that supports printmaking education, artist residencies, retreats, and collaborative projects across Australia, Italy, and the United States. Through workshops, symposiums, and immersive retreats, he is committed to fostering a global printmaking community grounded in curiosity, discipline, and authenticity.
As an educator, Francesco believes that teaching is not about instruction alone, but about sharing passion, encouraging experimentation, and cultivating disciplined curiosity. His practice and pedagogy are united by a commitment to thoughtful making and to printmaking as a living, evolving language rooted in both tradition and lived experience.
Join Francesco Geronazzo and discover monotype as an open, expressive printmaking process shaped by experimentation, intuition, and material engagement.
Gallery
Prints from the Course
