by Angelo Barzaghi

Founder and teacher at the Accademia Serigrafica

www.accademiaserigrafica.com

It must be understood that this is my highly personal perception. I have been working in screen printing for many years and, even today, I am experiencing it from a different viewpoint, having transformed my experiences into an important business. Since I began in 1987, my professional life (and not only) has changed significantly.

Serigraph printing, during those years, was perhaps the most frequently used and most technological tool available and there were many advantages, in spite of there being many limitations involved. Today, what we call off-line marketing, or external communications, was all based on screen printing.

Reaching your objective

Like in many other “trades”, even screen printing consisted of people who every day, driven by their own forces and energies, gave it their all, often thinking out of the box, but always succeeding in making a useful contribution to attaining the desired result... And what a result! Serigraph printing travelled along roads, whether on billboards or on vehicles, in cities and countrysides, on work clothes, shop and supermarket signs, on adhesives everywhere, on large posters, on cars, in interior decor and in the field of household appliances, and on almost anything that could be personalised. It was easy to transmit expertise and, with it, find systems for improvement. Products were changing and were being adapted to increasingly dynamic needs, aimed at obtaining concrete results even if conditions were often critical.

Manual skills and time

Over past decades, screen printing was for “tough guys”, for people who were easy going, even if it meant working with very dangerous substances, under conditions that were less than ideal and with rhythms that we cannot imagine, not even in comparison with the speed communication moves today. Every process was decided at the very beginning, from when the order was accepted and almost adapted to meet the client’s needs.

What we call graphic art today and is designed on a computer, years ago was entirely created by hand and in a dark room, with times and methods that today would be considered totally out of place: expertise and time were absolutely necessary. The printing process had to be included and decided upon according to production requirements, just like the result that the client requested: there were no alternatives, with it was done using that method, or it could not be created.

A noble profession

What I can say today is that screen printing got “lost along the way”: partly due to the advent of digital, partly due to a loss of contact with this business. Serigraph printing, like most techniques and jobs that imply manual skills and craftsmanship, has degenerated somewhat, above all in our country, to the point of almost becoming a stopgap business. Luckily, however, it is still considered a noble profession, above all by those companies that, even on the international scene, are making a difference, aware that serigraph printing is not a game, but a very serious activity!

Angelo Barzaghi, born 1958, has been a professional serigrapher since 1987 Over the years I have studied in depth, with an innovative experimental approach, the whole production cycle of serigraph printing, from the creation of subjects, films and looms to the research on materials and products, obtaining the highest quality results on printing and customisation. His accomplishments at the service of big clothing brands, gifts and many other sectors, last but not least art printing, range from fabrics to plastic materials, from wood to glass, to the various raw or treated supports, with specific in-depth studies on letterpress and digital press combined to serigraph printing. He is the author of the “Manuale di Serigrafia” (“Manual of Serigraphy”) (2004) and of a number of technical articles published on sector magazines, advisor for primary manufacturing and distributing companies, trainer in events dedicated to screen printing technologies and products. In 2008 he founded the Accademia Serigrafica® , organising courses addressed to serigraph printing companies, printers, graphic designers and any other subject that wanted to approach the world of serigraph printing to build a profession or open a business.