Stencil
Encyclopedia
A stencil is a thin sheet of material, such as paper, plastic, or metal, with letters or a design cut from it, used to produce the letters or design on an underlying surface by applying pigment through the cut-out holes in the material. The key advantage of a stencil is that it can be reused to repeatedly and rapidly produce the same letters or design. The design produced with a stencil is also called a stencil. The context in which stencil is used makes clear which meaning is intended. Although aerosol
or painting stencils can be made for one-time use, typically they are made to be reusable. To be reusable, they must remain intact after a design is produced and the stencil is removed from the work surface. With some designs, this is done by connecting stencil islands (sections of material that are inside cut-out "holes" in the stencil) to other parts of the stencil with bridges (narrow sections of material that are not cut out).
Stencil technique in visual art is also referred to as pochoir. A related technique (which has found applicability in some surrealist
compositions) is aerography
, in which spray-painting is done around a three-dimensional object to create a negative of the object instead of a positive of a stencil design. This technique was used in cave paintings dating to 10,000 BC, where human hands were used in painting hand print outlines among paintings of animals and other objects. The artist sprayed pigment around his hand by using a hollow bone, blown by mouth to direct a stream of pigment.
Screen printing also uses a stencil process, as does mimeography
. The masters from which mimeographed pages are printed are often called "stencils." Stencils can be made with one or many colour layers using different techniques, with most stencils designed to be applied as solid colours. During screen printing and mimeography the images for stenciling are broken down into color layers. Multiple layers of stencils are used on the same surface to produce multi-colored images.
Stencil paintings of hands were common throughout the prehistoric period. Stencils may have been used to colour cloth for a very long time; the technique probably reached its peak of sophistication in Katazome
and other techniques used on silks for clothes during the Edo period
in Japan. In Europe, from about 1450 they were commonly used to colour old master print
s printed in black and white, usually woodcut
s. This was especially the case with playing-cards, which continued to be coloured by stencil long after most other subjects for prints were left in black and white. Stencils were used for mass publications, as the type didn't have to be hand-written.
, Jean Saudé
and many other studios in Paris specialised in the technique. Low wages contributed to the popularity of the highly labour intensive process. When stencils are used in this way they are often called "pochoir".
In the Pochoir process, a print with the outlines of the design was produced, and a series of stencils were used through which areas of color were applied by hand to the page. To produce detail, a collotype
could be produced which the colors were then stenciled over. Pochoir was frequently used to create prints of intense color, and is most often associated with Art Nouveau
and Art Deco
design.
Aerosol stencils have many practical applications and the stencil concept is used frequently in industrial, commercial, artistic, residential and recreational settings, as well as by the military, government and infrastructure management. A template is used to create an outline for the image. Stencils templates can be made from any material which will hold its form, ranging from plain paper, cardboard, plastic sheets, metals and wood.
, since stencil art using spray-paint
can be produced quickly and easily. These qualities are important for graffiti artists where graffiti is illegal or quasi-legal, depending on the city and stenciling surface. The extensive lettering possible with stencils makes it especially attractive to political artists. For example, the anarcho-punk
band Crass
used stencils of anti-war
, anarchist
, feminist
and anti-consumerist
messages in a long-term graffiti campaign around the London Underground
system and on advertising billboards. Also well known for their use of stencil art are Blek le Rat
and Jef aerosol
from France, British artist Banksy
, New York artist John Fekner
, world traveling artist Above
, and Shepard Fairey
's OBEY
.
. Home decor stencils are an important part of the DIY (Do It Yourself) industry. There are prefabricated stencil templates available for home decoration projects from hardware stores, arts & crafts stores and through the internet. Stencils are usually applied in the home with a paint or roller brush along wall borders and as trim. They can also be applied with a painted sponge for a textured effect.
Stencil templates can be purchased or constructed individually. Typically they are constructed of flexible plastics, including acetate, mylar and vinyl. Stencils can be used as children's toys.
, as miniature shadow masks through which material can be deposited, etched or ions implanted onto a substrate. These stencils are usually made out of thin (100-500 nm) low-stress SiN in which apertures are defined by various lithographic techniques (e. g. electron beam, photolithography).
Stencil lithography
has unique advantages compared to other patterning techniques: it does not require spinning of a uniform layer of resist (therefore patterns can be created on 3D topographies) and it does not involve any heat or chemical treatment of the substrate (like baking, developing and removing the resist). Thus it allows a wide range of substrates (e.g. flexible, surface-treated) and materials (e. g. organics) to be used.
A stencil used in airbrushing called a frisket
is pressed directly on the artwork. It can be used control or contain overspray, create sharp or complex shapes, but is not designed to be used more than once.
Aerosol paint
Aerosol paint is a type of paint that comes in a sealed pressurized container and is released in a fine spray mist when depressing a valve button. A form of spray painting, aerosol paint leaves a smooth, evenly coated surface, unlike many rolled or brushed paints. Standard sized cans are portable,...
or painting stencils can be made for one-time use, typically they are made to be reusable. To be reusable, they must remain intact after a design is produced and the stencil is removed from the work surface. With some designs, this is done by connecting stencil islands (sections of material that are inside cut-out "holes" in the stencil) to other parts of the stencil with bridges (narrow sections of material that are not cut out).
Stencil technique in visual art is also referred to as pochoir. A related technique (which has found applicability in some surrealist
Surrealist techniques
Surrealism in art, poetry, and literature uses numerous techniques and games to provide inspiration. Many of these are said to free imagination by producing a creative process free of conscious control. The importance of the unconscious as a source of inspiration is central to the nature of...
compositions) is aerography
Aerography (arts)
Aerography is a surrealist method in which a stencil, which would have been used in spraypaintin, is replaced by a three-dimensional object. The Aerography technique is most recognizable as a blended and photorealistic style...
, in which spray-painting is done around a three-dimensional object to create a negative of the object instead of a positive of a stencil design. This technique was used in cave paintings dating to 10,000 BC, where human hands were used in painting hand print outlines among paintings of animals and other objects. The artist sprayed pigment around his hand by using a hollow bone, blown by mouth to direct a stream of pigment.
Screen printing also uses a stencil process, as does mimeography
Mimeograph machine
The stencil duplicator or mimeograph machine is a low-cost printing press that works by forcing ink through a stencil onto paper....
. The masters from which mimeographed pages are printed are often called "stencils." Stencils can be made with one or many colour layers using different techniques, with most stencils designed to be applied as solid colours. During screen printing and mimeography the images for stenciling are broken down into color layers. Multiple layers of stencils are used on the same surface to produce multi-colored images.
History
Katazome
Katazome is a Japanese method of dyeing fabrics using a resist paste applied through a stencil. With this kind of resist dyeing, a rice flour mixture is applied using a brush or a tool such as a palette knife. Pigment is added by hand-painting, immersion or both...
and other techniques used on silks for clothes during the Edo period
Edo period
The , or , is a division of Japanese history which was ruled by the shoguns of the Tokugawa family, running from 1603 to 1868. The political entity of this period was the Tokugawa shogunate....
in Japan. In Europe, from about 1450 they were commonly used to colour old master print
Old master print
An old master print is a work of art produced by a printing process within the Western tradition . A date of about 1830 is usually taken as marking the end of the period whose prints are covered by this term. The main techniques concerned are woodcut, engraving and etching, although there are...
s printed in black and white, usually woodcut
Woodcut
Woodcut—occasionally known as xylography—is a relief printing artistic technique in printmaking in which an image is carved into the surface of a block of wood, with the printing parts remaining level with the surface while the non-printing parts are removed, typically with gouges...
s. This was especially the case with playing-cards, which continued to be coloured by stencil long after most other subjects for prints were left in black and white. Stencils were used for mass publications, as the type didn't have to be hand-written.
Book illustration
Stencils were popular as a method of book illustration, and for that purpose the technique was at its height of popularity in France during the 1920s when André MartyAndré Edouard Marty
André Edouard Marty or A.E. Marty was a Parisian artist who worked mainly in the classic Art Deco style.-Career:A.E. Marty studied at the École des Beaux-Arts and Atelier Fernand Cormon in Montmartre, Paris...
, Jean Saudé
Jean Saudé
Jean Saudé was a French printmaker in Paris, known for his mastery of the pochoir technique. He trained with André Marty in the 1890s before starting his own workshop called Ibis. In 1925 he published Traité d'enluminure d'art au pochoir, a guide to the pochoir technique...
and many other studios in Paris specialised in the technique. Low wages contributed to the popularity of the highly labour intensive process. When stencils are used in this way they are often called "pochoir".
In the Pochoir process, a print with the outlines of the design was produced, and a series of stencils were used through which areas of color were applied by hand to the page. To produce detail, a collotype
Collotype
Collotype is a dichromate-based photographic process invented by Alphonse Poitevin in 1856. and was used for large volume mechanical printing before the existence of cheaper offset lithography. It can produce results difficult to distinguish from metal-based photographic prints because of its...
could be produced which the colors were then stenciled over. Pochoir was frequently used to create prints of intense color, and is most often associated with Art Nouveau
Art Nouveau
Art Nouveau is an international philosophy and style of art, architecture and applied art—especially the decorative arts—that were most popular during 1890–1910. The name "Art Nouveau" is French for "new art"...
and Art Deco
Art Deco
Art deco , or deco, is an eclectic artistic and design style that began in Paris in the 1920s and flourished internationally throughout the 1930s, into the World War II era. The style influenced all areas of design, including architecture and interior design, industrial design, fashion and...
design.
Aerosol stencils
Official use
Stencils are frequently used by official organizations, including the military, utility companies and governments, to quickly and clearly label objects, vehicles and locations. Stencils for official application can be customized, or purchased as individual letters, numbers and symbols. This allows the user to arrange words, phrases and other labels from one set of templates, unique to the item being labeled. When objects are labeled using a single template alphabet, it makes it easier to identify their affiliation or source.Stencil graffiti
Stencils have also become popular for graffitiGraffiti
Graffiti is the name for images or lettering scratched, scrawled, painted or marked in any manner on property....
, since stencil art using spray-paint
Aerosol paint
Aerosol paint is a type of paint that comes in a sealed pressurized container and is released in a fine spray mist when depressing a valve button. A form of spray painting, aerosol paint leaves a smooth, evenly coated surface, unlike many rolled or brushed paints. Standard sized cans are portable,...
can be produced quickly and easily. These qualities are important for graffiti artists where graffiti is illegal or quasi-legal, depending on the city and stenciling surface. The extensive lettering possible with stencils makes it especially attractive to political artists. For example, the anarcho-punk
Anarcho-punk
Anarcho-punk is punk rock that promotes anarchism. The term anarcho-punk is sometimes applied exclusively to bands that were part of the original anarcho-punk movement in the United Kingdom in the late 1970s and early 1980s...
band Crass
Crass
Crass are an English punk rock band that was formed in 1977, which promoted anarchism as a political ideology, way of living, and as a resistance movement. Crass popularised the seminal anarcho-punk movement of the punk subculture, and advocated direct action, animal rights, and environmentalism...
used stencils of anti-war
Anti-war
An anti-war movement is a social movement, usually in opposition to a particular nation's decision to start or carry on an armed conflict, unconditional of a maybe-existing just cause. The term can also refer to pacifism, which is the opposition to all use of military force during conflicts. Many...
, anarchist
Anarchism
Anarchism is generally defined as the political philosophy which holds the state to be undesirable, unnecessary, and harmful, or alternatively as opposing authority in the conduct of human relations...
, feminist
Feminism
Feminism is a collection of movements aimed at defining, establishing, and defending equal political, economic, and social rights and equal opportunities for women. Its concepts overlap with those of women's rights...
and anti-consumerist
Consumerism
Consumerism is a social and economic order that is based on the systematic creation and fostering of a desire to purchase goods and services in ever greater amounts. The term is often associated with criticisms of consumption starting with Thorstein Veblen...
messages in a long-term graffiti campaign around the London Underground
London Underground
The London Underground is a rapid transit system serving a large part of Greater London and some parts of Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire and Essex in England...
system and on advertising billboards. Also well known for their use of stencil art are Blek le Rat
Blek le Rat
Blek le Rat, born Xavier Prou in Boulogne-Billancourt, Paris in 1952, was one of the first graffiti artists in Paris, and has been described as the “Father of Stencil Graffiti” .-Early career and Influence:...
and Jef aerosol
Jef Aérosol
Jef Aérosol is a French stencil graffiti artist. He has been one of the main urban art proponents in France since 1982. He was born in Nantes. He belongs to the very first street art pioneers of the early 80s like Blek le Rat, Miss.Tic, Jérôme Mesnager, Speedy Graphito.He spray painted his first...
from France, British artist Banksy
Banksy
Banksy is a pseudonymous England-based graffiti artist, political activist, film director, and painter.His satirical street art and subversive epigrams combine irreverent dark humour with graffiti done in a distinctive stencilling technique...
, New York artist John Fekner
John Fekner
John Fekner is an innovative artist who created hundreds of environmental and conceptual outdoor works consisting of stenciled words, symbols, dates and icons spray painted in New York, Sweden, Canada, England and Germany in the 70s and 80s...
, world traveling artist Above
Above (artist)
ABOVE has been creating public art since 1995. Above is an international street artist who keeps his identity concealed. Above is known for his multi-layer/full color social and political stencils, spinning wooden "arrow mobile" installations, and large mural "word play" paintings. Above started...
, and Shepard Fairey
Shepard Fairey
Frank Shepard Fairey is an American contemporary graphic designer, and illustrator who emerged from the skateboarding scene. He first became known for his "André the Giant Has a Posse" sticker campaign, in which he appropriated images from the comedic supermarket tabloid Weekly World News. His...
's OBEY
Obey
Obey may refer to:*Obedience , the act of following instructions or recognizing someone's authority*André Obey, the 20th century French playwright*David Obey, US Congressman from Wisconsin...
.
Home stenciling
A common tradition for stencils is in home decorating and arts & craftsArts & Crafts
Arts & Crafts may refer to:* Arts and Crafts Movement, an aesthetic movement* Arts and crafts, activities related to making things with one's own hands and skill* "Arts & Crafts", a song by Red Light Company...
. Home decor stencils are an important part of the DIY (Do It Yourself) industry. There are prefabricated stencil templates available for home decoration projects from hardware stores, arts & crafts stores and through the internet. Stencils are usually applied in the home with a paint or roller brush along wall borders and as trim. They can also be applied with a painted sponge for a textured effect.
Stencil templates can be purchased or constructed individually. Typically they are constructed of flexible plastics, including acetate, mylar and vinyl. Stencils can be used as children's toys.
Silk screening
Silk screening is a style of clothing manufacture, in which an ink is embedded in the cloth of the fabric. The ink is controlled through the use of a stencil, which is placed directly over the shirt. This process can only handle one colour of ink at a time. Therefore, multi colored shirts must be silk screened several times, with each interval taking time to dry.Micro/nanostencil
Stencils are also used in micro/nanotechnologyNanotechnology
Nanotechnology is the study of manipulating matter on an atomic and molecular scale. Generally, nanotechnology deals with developing materials, devices, or other structures possessing at least one dimension sized from 1 to 100 nanometres...
, as miniature shadow masks through which material can be deposited, etched or ions implanted onto a substrate. These stencils are usually made out of thin (100-500 nm) low-stress SiN in which apertures are defined by various lithographic techniques (e. g. electron beam, photolithography).
Stencil lithography
Stencil lithography
Stencil lithography is a novel method of fabricating nanometer scale patterns. It is a resist-less, simple, parallel nanolithography process, and it does not involve any heat or chemical treatment of the substrates ....
has unique advantages compared to other patterning techniques: it does not require spinning of a uniform layer of resist (therefore patterns can be created on 3D topographies) and it does not involve any heat or chemical treatment of the substrate (like baking, developing and removing the resist). Thus it allows a wide range of substrates (e.g. flexible, surface-treated) and materials (e. g. organics) to be used.
Other stencil forms
A stencil technique is employed in screenprinting which uses a tightly woven mesh screen coated in a thin layer of emulsion to reproduce the original image. As the stencil is attached to the screen, a contiguous template is not necessary.A stencil used in airbrushing called a frisket
Frisket
A frisket is any material that protects areas of a work from unintended change.-Letterpress:On a sheet-fed letterpress printing machine, a frisket is a sheet of oiled paper that covers the space between the type or cuts and the edge of the paper that is to be printed...
is pressed directly on the artwork. It can be used control or contain overspray, create sharp or complex shapes, but is not designed to be used more than once.
See also
- AboveAbove (artist)ABOVE has been creating public art since 1995. Above is an international street artist who keeps his identity concealed. Above is known for his multi-layer/full color social and political stencils, spinning wooden "arrow mobile" installations, and large mural "word play" paintings. Above started...
- Blek le RatBlek le RatBlek le Rat, born Xavier Prou in Boulogne-Billancourt, Paris in 1952, was one of the first graffiti artists in Paris, and has been described as the “Father of Stencil Graffiti” .-Early career and Influence:...
- BanksyBanksyBanksy is a pseudonymous England-based graffiti artist, political activist, film director, and painter.His satirical street art and subversive epigrams combine irreverent dark humour with graffiti done in a distinctive stencilling technique...
- John FeknerJohn FeknerJohn Fekner is an innovative artist who created hundreds of environmental and conceptual outdoor works consisting of stenciled words, symbols, dates and icons spray painted in New York, Sweden, Canada, England and Germany in the 70s and 80s...
- Mimeograph
- Quarter marksQuarter marksQuarter marks are a type of ornamentation on a horse seen in certain types of exhibition or competition. Typically, these marks are found on the croup of the animal and are created by combing its hair in different directions, creating contrasting areas. The classic design was created by...
- ROSTA Windows
- Shepard FaireyShepard FaireyFrank Shepard Fairey is an American contemporary graphic designer, and illustrator who emerged from the skateboarding scene. He first became known for his "André the Giant Has a Posse" sticker campaign, in which he appropriated images from the comedic supermarket tabloid Weekly World News. His...
- Street ArtStreet artStreet art is any art developed in public spaces — that is, "in the streets" — though the term usually refers to unsanctioned art, as opposed to government sponsored initiatives...
- Theorem StencilTheorem StencilTheorem stencil, sometimes also called theorem painting or velvet painting, is the art of making stencils and using them to make drawings or paintings on fabric or paper.A vogue for theorem stencil painting began in England at the turn of the 19th century...
- WheatpasteWheatpasteWheatpaste is a liquid adhesive made from vegetable starch and water. It has been used since ancient times for various arts and crafts such as book binding, decoupage, collage, and papier-mâché...