Oregon Ink Spot Print

This is my print for the Oregon Ink Spot Exchange. Hopefully they will get there in time. This is an engraving on resingrave printed with Van Son rubber based ink, and printed on Unryu paper with chine cole. Yes it is a very wrinkled print. I think it has to do with getting a charge or thrill out of fighting in impossible circumstances.

Got a Gig

My supervisor threw some work my way- top secret work involving the Free Mason's Yearbook. Neither I nor he know all the details yet, but little bit by little bit I am getting more complicated things to draw. Mums the word. I'm also working on a drawing for a blind parapalegic (sp?).

Potato Prints

Way back in the day, when people had to live according to their means, children did not experience printmaking via lino cuts, oh no they just gave them a potato to carve and print. Given my own lack of monetary funds I have decided to give potato printing a shot.

This is my first try at it. It is a process that really doesn't require much at all.

The move back from PA, Goodbye Marywood

This was quite awhile ago the weekend of Dec. 15th, but I thought I would post it anyway. We thought we were making good time, and might beat the storm that was supposed to hit PA on Sunday. We were only about one third of the way through the Poconos when the snow started. It was a pleasant snow at first, but we soon felt its full force. Road flares glowed along the side of the highway, and the wreckage of split and twisted semi truck was only one of its victims. We thought that there had to be an end to this storm, so we kept on. It was still snowing in Ohio, but the road crews were very good there, and the roads were in very good shape. We didn't realize that the worst stretch of the road was still before us. Indiana. The lake effect snow was by far the worst we encountered on the road. The snowy conditions however was only exasperated by the ineffectual Indiana plows. We saw the plows on the road, but most of them did not even have their blades down. We kept on through to Chicago, where the difference was drastic, not only was the snow lighter, but the Chicago plows were actually doing their job, and doing their job very well. That's not to say that it still was not dangerous. A car a few lanes over from us lost control, and started spinning, fortunately there was nobody really close by so they didn't hit anybody. I found the picture online, and it pretty much conveys what it was like.

How did I get marked for the poor terrorist list

This article was recently brought to my attention, I got a laugh out of it anyway.

Goya's Ghosts

For Goya fans out there this movie is a must see. It really serves to put his work into the context of the times in which he was living. Although if I am not mistaken in real life he had quite a large family, in this there is no mention of it.

Exchanges and Calls for Entry

Any and all who are looking for print exchanges or shows to participate in should check out these two websites.

http://www.printmakingstudio.com/printexchanges.html

http://www.printmakers.info/listings.php

As I am sure many of the print makers out there are aware Print Zero studios runs a very large print exchange. I participated in it this year, the only requirement was that the paper size be 5x7. I just received the prints from this exchange, unfortunately the hand writing is not always easy to read on them, so I opted to not butcher their names horribly. According to the card they sent with the prints 291 print makers from 17 different countries participated this year, and the prints are also part of touring show. The dates and locations are as follows:

August 2007 - Sev Shoon/ Ballard Works
Seattle, WA

October 2007 - Print Walls Gallery
Madison, WI

October 2007 - Rainbow Building Gallery
University of Miami, Florida

March 2008 - Pratt Fine Gallery at Tashiro Kaplan
Seattle, WA

TBA - Pacific Northwest College of Arts
Portland, Oregon

Sesame Street Live

Unless you work for the theater group Sesame Street Live or have worked at a concert hall where they have performed you will never see this side of it, backstage. The Big Bird costume is the most complicated one that they have, so when it is not in use they hang him. Hanging it also makes it easier for dancer to get it on and off as it just has to be lowered or raised. Between Big Bird scenes in the show you will often see the top part of the costume hanging like this, but with the addition of a sweaty hyperventilating dancer sitting underneath it wearing Big Bird pants.

Dumbass

Decided to do some quick lithos of my LCC days, just because I saw and did things there that is unlikely to experience anywhere else. This one is setting up the portable basketball floor, which was one of the most onerous tasks we had. The panels weigh around 200 pounds each.

Cheese

Alright just bought some sharp cheddar from "Wisconsin", and its as crappy as the rest of the cheddar here, think tofu gone bad. So either they are lying, or they're buying from a lousy dairy. Just wanted to say that for the sake of those non Wisconsin people out there, the WI cheese in these out of state stores cannot even be said to be a paltry imitation of the sublime wonder that is a WI sharp cheddar.

Alright this is my first oil painting, a little bit got shaved off the sides as it was a tad bit wider than the scanner.

Paper making

Any and all who are interested in paper and paper making should visit this site:

http://aic.stanford.edu/sg/bpg/annual/v15/bp15-21.html

It has all kinds of good information about the history of papermaking and how our technical advancements have impacted the end product (pretty much for the worse)

Oh yeah for any paper makers who might read this, if you want to make a paper you can actually write on with pencil try adding chalk into the pulp mix.

Michelangelo

We've also been discussing Michelangelo in Aesthetics, and he's been giving us some interesting information. One trivia fact that Michelangelo was present and watching the unearthing of the Farnese Bull, which is a Roman copy of a massive, carved from a single block, Hellenistic sculpture. This sculpture is evidently a compositional marvel because it looks good from any angle. Also we have been discussing how he combined the restfullness of classicism with the turbulence of Hellenistic art. Wolflin when doing a formal analysis of the Sistine Chapel was the first to notice that all of figures have restful contours on one side, and then are turbulent on the other.

Mavericks and Miscreants of Art History

Caravaggio one of the greatest artists in history was also a bit of a miscreant. Reportedly when he mysteriously appeared in Rome he was "naked and extremely needy." Thanks to his skill as painter he was quickly able to gain work as a successful artist. Unfortunately the man liked to fight, and ended up accidently killing someone. Not even his painting could save him then, and he had to flee Rome. He went to Naples for awhile and then bounced over to Malta where he was inducted in as a knight of Malta. Yet again he got in trouble for fighting, this time he injured another knight, and was kicked out of the oder for being "a foul and rotten member." He ended up returning to Naples convinced that people were pursuing him, and he wasn't wrong about that. An attempt was made on his life, and for awhile people believed him to be dead until he opted to reveal himself; his face had been horribly disfigured. Friends he had in Rome were able to procure a pardon for him from the pope, but he died of a fever in 1610 en route to Rome.

Color litho

This one was destined for having color from the start, instead of using a litho pencil I drew this using a green prismacolor pencil. It was actually a pretty stable etch. The whole thing was done using only one stone.

2 Lithos one drawing

For whatever reason lithography has been feeling really good to me right now. On this one after finishing with printing it I started to grinding, but stopped after a couple passes of the levigator because the image was being modified in a rather beautiful way, so I stopped and etched it. It pretty much worked.

Can't forget about the elephants

These paintings were done by elephants in Thailand, evidently if you go there you can buy one for $15.

Humans are so egotistical

We so often forget that we are not the only ones who paint. Chimpanzees enjoy painting. In fact due to the construction of their arms and their massive strength they are capable of producing brush strokes that a human just physically cannot duplicate. These two paintings are by Congo, who produced over 400 drawings and paintings in his lifetime.

Emil Nolde

Prior to New York and abstract expressionism, the hot bed of the art world was in Germany in its own expressionism. There were a few different groups going on at this point in time, die Brucke, die blaue Reiter, and Bauhaus ( actually more based on Dadaism). The members of die Brucke through experimentation made several breakthroughs in printmaking technique. Emil Nolde was one of those members. He made lithographs, woodcuts, and is perhaps better known for his paintings, but by far his intaglio prints are what stand out. Out of the entire die Brucke group he was the only one with prior experience in intaglio, and he kept his secrets to himself. It is known though that starting in around 1907 he switched from using copper plates to iron. Reputedly because he liked the shine of the iron plates.