Oftentimes, after pulling the first print, one needs to touch-up the block or plate and the print is marked 1st state and the second print is pulled. If there’s more touch-up needed, this print is marked 2nd state and so on until one is satisfied and ready to start printing the edition.
Artists usually keep the first finished print and mark it AP (artist’s proof).
Next, the artist prints as many copies as decided or until the plate starts deteriorating, making sure to keep the prints in the order in which they were printed and after they’re dry, they are numbered, signed and titled using a hard pencil. All this is done on the white part at the bottom of the print.
Once the decision is made regarding the number of prints in the edition, the numbering is done in this fashion, (let’s say the full edition is of 25 prints),1/25, 2/25, 3/25 etc.
Normally, after filling the edition, one destroys the block or plate. If the artist decides to keep the plate, he/she has the choice to re-work it so that it would be at least 25% different from the original, or pull another edition that would be clearly marked “Second Edition”.
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