The Ladder
A3 — the largest sheet in the studio
A ladder climbing out of the dark, cut into a single plate. At A3 the hatching stops being texture and becomes structure: you can follow one cut across the whole sheet.
A3Framed
Claws · Gramophones · Moka
Small format · framed · also on shirts and totes
The studio · Bern
About
My name is Richard Cervenka and I cut linoleum blocks in Bern.
Relief printing forces a decision. There is no grey — only black or paper — and that hardness is what pulled me in. Everything you see as white has been cut away, and a cut cannot be taken back. You can only keep cutting.
I print without a press, by hand. It is slower and it limits how many sheets exist, which is why the editions stay small and why no two prints are ever quite identical.
Every sheet is signed and numbered in pencil on the back, with the place and the date. The small formats are printed by me as well — signed, dated and stamped. Only the reproductions and the postcards are unsigned. The framed pieces are set in black wood behind an off-white mat; the frames in the photographs are for illustration only.
Bern · Switzerland · Linocut
Cut by hand,
pulled by hand.
Original relief prints from a linoleum block. Every plate is cut by me, every sheet is pulled by hand, and every print is signed and numbered in a small edition.
How a print is made
No press, by hand.
Filmed in the studio in Bern. Keep scrolling – the film moves with you.
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Cutting
The image is cut into the lino block in mirror image. Whatever the gouge takes away stays white on the paper.
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The block
Die Leiter, fully cut. Every line and every ray is a single cut.
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Inking
A roller lays a thin, even coat of ink on the block. Only the ridges left standing take the ink.
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Pulling
Lay the paper down, press it by hand, peel it off slowly. Only now do you see whether the sheet worked.
One work from each format
A3, A4, small format
One work from each format. Every A3 and A4 piece on this site is shown in the same frame on the same wall, in the same afternoon light — my own frame, photographed once, with each print set into it. The format written under every piece is the format the plate was actually cut at; nothing is rounded up to sound larger.
Esplanade, Paris
A4 — and the sky is nothing but cuts
A street sign, a lamp post and the tower behind them in one plate. Nothing here is shaded: that sky is several hundred parallel cuts, each one made by hand.
A4Framed
Claws
Small format — and it goes on shirts and totes
One of three repeat plates. The base sheet is 11.5 × 16 cm, because that is the size they were cut at. The pattern also runs across a shirt and a tote bag — those two are printed to order by a print partner in Europe, not cut and printed by hand in the studio. The other two are Gramophones and Moka.
11.5 × 16 cmSmall format · on shirt and tote
Complete catalogue · linocut prints
All works
Every plate in the studio. The A3 and A4 works are shown framed and hung, all in the same frame and the same light; the small-format sheets are shown loose, as they are sold. The exact size is written on every single work — filter by A3, A4 or small format to see only that size.
No works in this category.
Commission requests
A block cut for you
A commission is a new linoleum plate, cut from scratch for one subject — a building, a portrait, a boat, a logo. It becomes an edition that exists only for you, and the original plate is yours at the end if you want it.
01
You send a photograph
One good image is enough. I will tell you honestly whether it translates into a cut — high contrast works, soft grey haze does not — before you pay anything.
02
A drawing for approval
I redraw the subject in pure black and white and send it to you. Nothing is cut until you are happy with that drawing, because a cut cannot be undone.
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Cutting and printing
The plate is cut, proofed, and then printed by hand. How long it takes depends on the size and on how full the studio is — I will give you a date once I have seen the subject.
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Signed, numbered, sent
Each sheet is signed and numbered in pencil on the back and carries a blind stamp pressed into the paper. Everything ships from Switzerland.
Or reach me directly