Introduction to and Information about this website
The evolution of book printing (Gutenberg) and of lithography (Senefelder) is is described in literature. The history of screen printing is not so well defined in any detail. Neither is much known about the pioneers of the process although in early American reference works the introduction of screen printing is briefly described. Later history of the process appears in specialist journals or company literature but has been for the most part forgotten.
Since the 1970s two important works concerning the history of screen printing were published. These were by Claus W Gerhardt (Germany 1974) and Elinor Noteboom (USA 1992). However, further research has since then found documents dealing with hitherto either unknown or forgotten aspects of screen printing in the USA and Europe.
History has no relationship to nostalgia! Rather more it holds in awe the work of earlier generations and cannot contradict future developments.
The Internet is, conditionally, a learning medium so as many important illustrations and texts about interesting personalities as possible should be made available online. Should the surfer be interested in the history of printing processes generally and not have any particular idea of what screen printing actually is, then click to the link "Screen Printing Technique" at the top of this page where the principles of screen printing and its uses are briefly described.
The subject has many stratas. Because of this an attempt has been made to keep the website as simple as and as manageable as possible. It consists here of four colour-coded sections:
Olive Green (as on this page) – a brief overview of stencil printing, the forerunner of silk screen printing, plus historical aspects of textile printing and serigraphy.
Red – information about the appearance and development of screen printing in the USA.
Bright Green –information about the appearance and development of screen printing in Great Britain.
Blue – manufacture of silk gauze and the development of silk screen processes in continental Europe.
Each of these sections has an individual contents index which can be found in the lft hand margin. Each index is ordered so that the contents hopefully follow a logical and digestible sequence. Illustrations in the left hand margin supplement the text. These can be considered in greater detail by fully opening a window. (Please note that the images have a very high resolution and may therefore demand some time to download but do not generally exceed 100KB per image. A fast Internet connection is recommended.)
We would like to thank all the contemporary witnesses, or their descendants, the companies, archives as well as all the persons who have been involved in this project (link at the top of this page). They have made possible the access to the information which is displayed here. In particular, the following companies and persons have granted an insight into many unpublished documents as yet (the rights of the illustrations shown on this site are their property):
- SEFAR, Thal/Switzerland (documents related to the history of the
silk tissue manufacture, correspondence)
- SERICO-Eich, Dietikon/Switzerland (company’s correspondence, SELECTASINE manual)
- Johannes Ulrich, Ulrich Family, Lohn/Switzerland (sketches by Hans Caspar Ulrich)
A special thank goes also to Axel Friedrich, Zurich, Eugen Jost, Thun, Richard Eisenbeiss, Berne and Urs Lengwiler, Winterthur, for their great support.
Translations: Isabelle Held, Frick, Roger Nixon, London, Thomas Iredale, Heidelberg
© Guido Lengwiler, Basle, Switzerland
