David Shrigley|Copenhagen Prints (Schäfer Editions)

The prints in this series grew out of a partnership of more than twenty years. Shrigley began working with Michael Schäfer at his Copenhagen workshop in 2002, and he says the work he made there changed his view of printmaking. At art school in Glasgow he "considered the printmakers to be losers", a prejudice that "subsided about a decade later when I made my first etchings in Copenhagen."

Cutting, biting and drawing on stone

He has described the difference between drawing and printing in physical terms: a pen line on paper is an expression, "whereas the mark you make on a printing plate is a small, controlled act of violence." Linocut, woodcut and etching all begin with that kind of mark. In a linocut, everything meant to stay white is gouged out of the linoleum, so the lines and lettering left standing are the parts that take the ink. For the etchings, lines are scratched through a waxy ground on a metal plate, and acid then bites them deep enough to hold the ink; 'Do Not Underestimate My Thirst' adds aquatint for areas of tone. The 2014 lithograph 'The Paper Weighs Nothing' was drawn on stone.

Jokes about the medium

Several titles turn Shrigley's deadpan humour on printmaking and on art itself. The full title of 'The Paper Weighs Nothing' is 'The Paper Weighs Nothing But the Ink Is Heavy'. 'Ink / Paper' names its own materials, 'Learn to Draw' issues an order, and 'Small Print' lives up to its name at 10.5 x 10.5 cm. 'My Artwork Is Terrible' goes on, in its full title, to confess 'And I Am A Very Bad Person'.

Back to the block

The workshop had already printed Shrigley's woodcut portfolios, including the two 'Ten Woodcuts' sets of 2007 and 2008. The woodcuts in this series are single sheets instead, such as 'Two Heads Woodcut' of 2016. From 2024 he returned to the block more often, with 'I Will Not Be Ridden' and 'I Woke You Up At Dawn I Make No Apology', followed in 2025 by 'Sorry I Snapped at You' and 'Pig Loves You'. In January 2026 the workshop printed two untitled woodcuts, one of them in eight colours.

Twenty years, one exhibition

In May 2024 Jealous Gallery in London marked twenty years of the collaboration with 'Copenhagen Prints'. The show brought together more than 40 of his Schäfer prints, displayed with some of the plates and tools used to make them. New works made for it included the etching 'Do Not Underestimate My Thirst'.