LEWISTON — The Bates College Museum of Art will host a family printmaking workshop for ages 5 and up from 3:15 to 5 p.m. Friday, Nov. 17. The workshop takes place in the Benjamin Mays Center at 95 Russell St.

Space is limited and registration is required. To make a reservation, please call 207-786-8212. The workshop fee is $5 per person. 

Participants will learn about the aesthetics and history of block printing through examples from the museum’s collection. They will also learn how to handle printmaking tools, carve or cut their own design into a print block, and make prints from that block.

“We want this to be a fun, creative experience for parents and children,” says Abigail Abbott, the college’s Museum Education Fellow. “Participants will take home prints in the form of notecards, which they can use to share their creativity with friends and loved ones.”

Relief printing is one of the world’s oldest print techniques. Anthony Shostak, education curator at the museum, describes printmaking as a “multi-step technique that challenges the artist to use abstract thinking from the beginning of the process to the final product.”