Jennifer D Anderson

Almost Reality II

The Almost Reality exhibition at DVAC will include twelve images from my shades series.

This is a recent statement I wrote about this work:

I layer imagine upon imagine, skin on top of a portrait, lace below an x-ray, toys with old age, a variety of faces. I layer photographs I have taken, ones I have found, handwritten notes and medical diagrams. I layer to reflect how human identity is a composite of stories, memories, information, physical sensations, as well as the mechanisms that make one human.

 

I adhere whisper thin sheets of paper together until they are inseparable. I adhere to create images with a three-dimensional depth as one layer is seen through another and another.  I adhere because we are amalgamation, complex and nuanced our identity includes the physical, spiritual, past and present – one part cannot be removed from the rest.

 

I contrast, male and female, beauty and horror, skin and bone, childhood and senility. I contrast to reflect the richness of the human experience and our dualities. I contrast front and back to let the curious viewer see more, to express how we always are more than what the eye first sees.

 

I cut with small sharp scissors, shaping these images into the profile silhouette of one of my models. I cut to reference the work back to the body, to point to the commonality of the human form, as the vessel we each temporarily have to hold our own stories. 

Upcoming Exhibition

My work will be including in a three person exhibition at Dayton Visual Arts Center opening a week from today. The title Almost Reality poetically embraces the concept of truth, mistruth and the visual image.

The Dust Has Settled

I thought I would take the opportunity to post images of my studio renovation project. The first photographs are the before images. A garage that was in poor shape to say the least and a workable but not opportune studio.

The garage was without windows and the door when closed was not fully sealed so the space was often extremely dusty and grimy. It was also dark and cluttered due to poorly constructed overhead storage. As you can tell from these photos, the walls were only partly covered with drywall and nothing really matched.

The decision was to open the space up by removing the loft storage and by installing two large windows.

Drywall was hung on all four walls with the raw beams of the ceiling left exposed to give the space a clean yet rustic  feel.

Drywall was hung, a laminate floor installed as well as overhead and spot lighting. Its absolutely beautiful! 

I knew things would be well done, when I spoke with the contractor and he mentioned his own stone carvings. These photos were taken right after I started moving back in. I have moved my flat file and a few other items in since. I decided to also remove the motor from the press and its wheel is now intact and printing beautifully. The project will be fully complete once glass is placed within the doors. And have I mentioned I am counting the days until my semester break?

Sketchbook Project 3

I participated Art House's Sketchbook project earlier this year. All artists were sent a similar beige moleskin sketchbook and asked to respond to the theme of everyone you know.

 I decided to take the book apart and replace its plain pages with found paper pages that from an old ledger that I first printed on. I then recreated the book and drew on all of the pages. These images are just a few spreads.

Pat Merrill Fine Art

Twenty-three miles past downtown LA, but just a short distance off of the 10, Patrick Merrill Fine Art, is within an industrial warehouse area in Covina. Unglamorous but affordable this location seems to fit Patrick, his work and his ideologies about printmaking.

Patrick, a native Southern Californian, first dabbled in printmaking in high school. And after completing a tour of duty in Vietnam, he quickly returned to both. His first college class, a screen-printing class at Golden West College left a life-long impression as his instructor’s words “Graphics should kick you in the teeth” seem to be the cornerstone of Patrick’s personal work and his approaches to working with artists as a master printer as he strives for intensity and quality in both.

With a thorough understanding of the history of printmaking and the ability to look at it in an objective and critical way, Patrick utilizes the media in different modes.  Using his skills as a master printer, he creates, under a variety of pseudonyms, large editions of hand-pulled botanical and other bland prints for interior decorators and art consultants. Cleverly demanding that he is paid up front, he creates these prints solely as product while also removing himself from the fickleness of the market.

For his own work Patrick makes huge prints, proving his prowess as a printer and taking his images to a new level as his figures confront the viewer in a life size scale allowing the graphics to literally kick the viewer in the teeth. Here you see one of my students standing next to one of Patrick’s blocks and a portion of the completed print on the wall at the far left of the slide. Patrick is not afraid of presenting political issues in his work and he does so with a complex and sophisticated voice that reflects back on the political and democratic history of printmaking. The work is visually intricate filled with metaphor and allegory giving a reading that is dense and lush.

As a master printer, Patrick is interested in working with artists who want to engage printmaking in a way that extends past simply making multiples and who are open to collaborating on a variety of levels. Process is akin to play for me and while it has its place I don’t see it as serious art.  He states “I place content before form. I ask that the formal structures support and inform the narrative especially when that narrative is the formal structures itself. I want to be caught up in a dialogue with the artist. I want to be intrigued.”

 

He has had a long relationship as working as a printer for the artist Michael Woodcock. Here a multicolor lithograph titled Short Pencils. These pieces are invested with craft and intention and have a personal shrine-like quality focused in a simple pop-like composition. They seem to present a sly comment on the history of the printed image and its ability to give honor and meaning to mundane objects.

Recently Patrick has worked with Alexandra Grant producing this etching, Nimbo. His interest in working with Alexandra springs from what he refers to as her hybrid practice, and how she moves fluidly between two and three-dimensional medias and the potential and seeing how she will continue this further in the printed form. I find it interesting in talking with Pat how he emphasized the power of words and their affect, something that Alexandra may be toying with in her work.

Forty miles of freeway exist between the presses of John Greco in Santa Monica and Patrick Merril in Covina. It does not seem like a lot, but in traveling them the change in climate, architecture, and environment is strikingly obvious. These two men like everyone else who I have presented in this paper operate their presses in their own portion of LA and in their own way. They are all different, but all seem focused on moving ahead and keeping the presses running.

Hard Pressed Studio

On the other side of downtown LA, in the loft area of the city often referred to as the Arts District, Hard Pressed Studios presents yet another aspect of printmaking and a striking contrast both in terms of process, style and ownership.

Hard Pressed Studios is a relatively new press, founded five years ago by artist and masterprinter Karen Fiorito. Karen, like so many others in LA, made a slow migration from the East coast towards the west coast with a long pause as she completed her MFA in printmaking at Arizona State University. It was there that her work flourished into its present politically driven form and as she completed her thesis research she began making contacts with like-minded artists in LA.

 Her move to LA was speared on by Robbie Conal and John Carr both of whom have now collaborated extensively with Karen. As a political artist herself, she was drawn to the quick nature and relatively low cost of process color screen printing for images to be postered and pasted up. And as a masterprinter Karen now seems to walk the lines between the world of street art and fine art printing, as she masterfully hand prints extremely detailed and exacting high quality works for artists like Conal, Shephard Fairey and Mear One.

Artists who grativate to her for the hand-printed quality of her process, her fluency in screen printing and her ability to handle special materials such as glitter, flocking and metallics without sacrificing quality. The image here is one of Robbie Conal’s musicians’ triptych that Karen printed.

And it is not by chance Karen has and continues to work with such artists (here Dwellone’s Peace 47) but rather it reflects her philosophy on printmaking as a whole.  In her own words, “I choose to work with mostly political artists because I believe that the true nature of printmaking is to take the means of production out of the hands of the corporations (or the ruling class) and put it back in the hands of artists. It has taken me a while to come to that realization, but I believe that is what first attracted me to the medium: in printmaking, the medium is the message.” 

Aardvark Press

Although Aardvark Letterpress and Fine Art Editions is just twelve miles inland from Santa Monica, the journey can easily take over an hour to complete. The press is located just a few blocks away from Mc Arthur Park. An area of Los Angeles where dualities often collided, as gang members and police officers alike have commented violent acts silhouetted against the natural beauty of the area and the outlines of luxury condos just a few blocks further east. In this neighborhood and honestly in any other, Aardvark is a jewel, an example of the innovation and hard work behind a successful American dream as well as the quality and beauty of a handmade, hand printed item. 

Before Aardvark was a press it was a typography company with an employee named Luis Ocon. An expert typographer and linotype operator who had emigrated from Mexico to pursue a better life, Luis jumped at the opportunity to purchase the company in 1978.  With a great deal of foresight Luis decided within two years to change the focus of Aardvark to printing and purchased his first press.  As the computer was radically altering the world and making hard type quickly become obsolete and antiquated, Luis was establishing Aardvark as the premier letterpress shop in the Los Angeles area and so ensured the longevity of his business.

Brooks Ocon, master pressman, designer and Luis’ son, emphasizes the quality and possibility of the letterpress process in both commercial and artistic practices, and his expertise is heightened by the shop’s extensive facilities including a linotype machine, two Ludlow typesetting machines along with their Chandler and Price and Heidelberg presses. This equipment combined with the expertise and knowledge of their staff reflects in how Aardvark creates letterpress work that fully exploits the physical qualities and dimensionality of the process.
 
As the company decided to focus a portion of their energies and resources to fine art publishing, they did so with the hopes of introducing these same qualities to the work of fine artists. Their first project a series of prints based on the 54 card deck of loteria began as a celebration of Aardvark’s 30 anniversary. But once the project was begun, the brothers realized they were doing something that was unique in its own rights and certainly within the spectrum of printmaking within LA.

The popular Mexican game of chance, so common place, so iconic serves as a perfect symbol for both the cross-cultural diversity of LA as well as for the collaborative process of printmaking as a whole. The press selected LA based artists and designers asking each to create a new interpretation of a selected card. Here is relief printmaker Dave Lefner’s classically nostalgic card number 23, El Inverso, and comic strip creator Sammy Harkham’s cool and refined card number 26 Domingo.

 Dan McCleary’s card number 0 Le Calavera reflects his skill as a draftsman and Cristia Pedron’s number 38 El Tiroteo reflects on her abilities as a designer to a give form and poetry to something as unattractive as the reality of a drive-by-shooting. As the press is working on continuing and extending this project, they are making clear a process that could be seen as vintage is indeed as relevant as ever.

Angeles Press

Also on the west side of the city, Angeles Press is located in a row of shops in an area of Santa Monica that was just beginning to boom before the recent economic down turn.  The glass windows of each store and business along Ocean Park Boulevard allow passers-by a glimpse inside and at number 1616 it is the large litho press that catches the attention and surprise of most. This is the fourth location for Angeles Press and in talking with Toby and Mary, they presented its history as punctuated and happily defined by every recession since it's founding making it apparent they are optimists as well as committed printmakers.

Tobey Michel is different from most master printers who run and operate a small press, as he will quickly and in no uncertain terms declare he is not and has never been an artist. His talents and passion lie in the collaboration, the dance of give and take the master printer has with an artist. He took lithography, as the last three credits he had to complete as an undergraduate and like most students had no idea what he was really registering for, but fell in love with the process. He went on to study architecture at Harvard and when laid off from work during the recession of the 1970's, he decided to return to what he smilingly referred to as a recession proof business, lithography.  

In 1976, Tobey started the master printers program at Tamarind with Mary there as a curatorial fellow.  It was the gas crunch of the late 1970's and its impact on commuting across the city that forced Tobey and Mary to become self-employed in order to use their training and pursue their passions. Taking the risk, they founded Angeles Press in 1980.  Mary quickly went and purchased a large wall calendar like the used at Tamarind to designate when artists and clients would be in the shop. With their empty calendar on the wall, the pair quickly realized the one of the hardest tasks they would face, as a new press would be filling it.

Like so many other shops, Angeles Press hit a pinnacle point in the 1980's a decade that found them in their largest space, with five employees and working with a variety of well-known artists, in particular Jim Dine.  Dine, known for his often-harsh words for master printers, has commented favorably on how Tobey will try anything and runs a  “terrific operation at Angeles Press.” Ironically, they state almost of their publishing in the past almost thirty years has been done for non-profits, such as the Frostig Collections a non-profit that sells multiples to benefit social skills education in children with disabilities, institutions and organizations like The Academy of Motion Pictures, individual artists and New York galleries. Their hesitation to say they have never printed for a gallery in LA seems to lay in the fear of both the meaning and impact of that statement.

After 30 years of printing, Tobey and Mary are again taking risks.  The physical strains of printing and working with the chemicals needed for lithography, along with increases in reliability for large format inkjet printers has led them to compliment their work in traditional printmaking with a foray into the digital world. And in treating the computer as another printing tool, the pair feels they are collaborating with artists in a similar way.  Tobey refers to it as controlled abandon; using his skills and knowledge to allow artists to create prints in a way that has a natural ease suited to their working habits and artistic goals.  

Josephine Press

Located a little past Cloverfield on the Santa Monica Boulevard, Josephine Press is unassumingly wedged between a BMW dealership and an acupuncture office. A transplant from the East, who got his MFA at Kent State University, John Greco  established the press in 1984 out of a desire to help other artists and himself, as according to John, the Santa Monica area in the early 1980’s did not have an adequate facility for artists to create prints. Today the shop is a resource for many and with his busy schedule John finds almost no time to make his own work.

Josephine Press is a modest but comfortable shop, with two presses, a large format Epson printer and everything an artist could need stored within its shelves. John keeps the shop versatile, working with artists in almost all print media. This versatility has been the key to the press’ survival over the past twenty-five years. As in his words John cannot find the balance between the processes of making and marketing art.  Without a steady income for the sell of prints, John, like many other artists and entrepreneurs, has developed multiple strategies for generating income and staying afloat even in volatile times.  

John has taught printmaking at Santa Monica College for years and his teaching also extends to Josephine Press where he teaches a variety of workshops. The most interesting on the agenda is a weekly Thursday night workshop that allows any interested artists to use the shop and John’s knowledge for three and a half hours needing only to bring paper, their plates, and the minimal fee of $25.  This open door workshop is unique and perhaps the only of its kind outside of a community college setting in the LA area. On any given Thursday night the diversity of this group is amazing and can range from graduate students from Claremont programs, to an education specialist from the Getty to a local special education teacher all in queue to use the press.  After working with John in his formal workshops, artists can also rent the shop for a day, or evening and in the past months John has been able to rent out the shop for 3 or more days a week meaning that someone is there working at almost all times.

The concept of community is important to John and it can be easily be seen in both his desire for artists to use his shop and in how he is always drumming up new members for the Los Angeles Printmaking Society. Thus said it is easy to understand why John has developed strong relationships with many artists as a master printer over the past twenty years. And those who keep returning include Michael C. McMillan whose work you see here, Nancy Regelman, Joe Piasentin and Ruth Leaf, herself the author of a text on intaglio processes.

The print you see now,  “One More Line” was Raymond Pettibon’s contribution to an exhibition of intaglio prints by a selected group of the artists John has worked with over the years. Perhaps David Pagel summed the press up best in his essay for the exhibition “artsy hotbeds are the stuff of Hollywood movies, and what I found when I went through the Dutch door at the entrance to Josephine Press was even better: a lively beehive of art-lovers driven to do it themselves.”

 

Printmaking in Los Angeles – Printed Strata – The lesser know and unknown

Los Angeles stretches across a vast geographic, demographic and cultural expanse resulting in a city without one nucleus or Mecca. Rather, the multiple points of reference of the Los Angeles are reflected in how it is a decentralized city with a phlera of nuclei, each a hub of energy, excitement and most often art. Arguably this affects the habits of all of LA’s citizens, especially her artists and creative professionals.  In this presentation, I am focusing on how printmaking in Los Angeles is like the city itself varied, dynamic and decentralized. The vantage point I have chosen to use is that of the small presses and the master printers who often own, as well as direct, these shops that are randomly dotted across Los Angeles County.

I have selected this frame of reference due to how unlike the larger more well known presses of Los Angeles, the smaller presses, by nature and out of need to survive interact with a audience of artists ranging from blue chip to unknown and so develop more variety in their means of exchange and dialogue about printmaking and are often places for innovation, education and simply access to the media.  These places and people clearly make their mark, with inky fingerprints on the lives and careers of many artists and contribute in their own ways to the artistic fabric of LA.  I am presenting a small selection of presses that vary in their philosophies, approaches and history. So join me, as we make our crawl down the 10 corridor from the beach areas of Santa Monica to the far east reaches of Los Angeles County.

2009!

Wow, its 2009! Change and hope, those are the buzz words right. So with that in mind, I thought I would begin my presence on here for this year with an image of what I have been working on and with a quote.

"Dum spiro, spero", that's Latin for while I breathe, I hope. Fairly profound, no?

Contemporary Art for Change

One of my smaller pieces will be in this silent auction for a great cause tomorrow in Culver City, Contemporary Art for Change! I got to see a preview of the exhibition today and it looks great. It also sounds like an fun event for all.

Working with found paper

Recently I have included found paper in my work. Often pages from old journals, ledgers and so on. The attraction is two fold for me, as it seems a wonderfully eco-conscious thing to create art from left-behind papers that would most likely be turned in refuse and it also seems a way to capture a bit of the intrinsic energy from others who have touched or written on this paper. Its perfect for my work.

Recently I have also discovered the work of two other artists who use found paper although to very different ends. Georgia Russell totally transforms found books into sculptural works. She claims her scalpel to be her brush and it certainly appears to be. Her recreation of Baudelaire is hauntingly surreal.

And of course Brian Dettmer's work is not to be missed. Cutting away the written text of old illustrated books, Brian creates a different kind of book sculpture, a visual labyrinth of dissected bits of what was meant to be written knowledge.

New print

Here's a new little print that I have been working on. Like the work that I will be showing later this fall at JK Gallery this piece is on found paper and is a combination of lithographic and inkjet print processes. The work is also about a combinations: a mixture of different aspects of the physical body and memory.

A Really Big Announcement

Well the good news of the day is that my work will be shown at JK Gallery in Culver City! The gallery is part of the gallery strip along La Cienega, so its easy to find and there's lots of other things to see nearby. The show opens on November 1 with a reception that evening from 6PM to 8PM. My work will be shown along with the work of another LA based artist Diane Cockerill, so I will be sharing a lot about the process and exhibition in upcoming blogs.

Now you know where to find me - Here's where to find my Art

As I mentioned in the last posting, I have been busy teaching and settling in at Orange Coast College. And along with that busy-ness, I have the pleasure to announce my work is currently in a three group exhibitions Southern California.

Contemporary Ruin is a group exhibition at the California Center for the Arts Museum in Escondido. The show presents the work of artists whose work "explores the stunning, uncomfortable and sometimes unpleasant aspects of the ruins of our contemporary society." The show is up until November 30th. The curators selected three prints of mine from the Belligerency Suite for this show which I think is a perfect tie in to the exhibition theme, as I see this work bring about our understanding and conceptions of the ruin of the body and psyche that occurs in war.

Otherwise in the Los Angeles area, you will find my work in another group show in a museum setting. This time at the Craft and Folk Art Museum (which is the wonderful funky space across from LACMA and the Brea Tar Pits.) This show's title Identity Unlimited Editions shows works from artists that deal with the multiple and changing perspectives of self; cultural, physical, spiritual and otherwise. I created a new piece for this show. Titled "Identity Visceral" this piece combines what are beautiful almost floral images of the organs of the body with embossed silhouettes. This exhibition just opened this weekend and will run until January 11, 2009.

And lastly for now, you can find me this weekend at the opening for the Brand 37: Thirty-Seventh National Juried Exhibition, Works on Paper: Here & Now. The Brand Library and Art Center has such an interesting exhibition space and such a great staff! Kim Abeles made the selections for this show and reading through the list, she has chosen an inspiring group of artists. You will find my "Existence Books" in this show (a girl has to prove she exists doesn't she?)

Life Lately

My words often are the same, or at least it seems my beginnings often are. So here's an attempt to shine a bit of light on what I have been doing and where I have been in these past few months.

I am teaching - nothing new about that. I have been doing so for years now at various colleges and institutions, but this fall I started a full time position teaching printmaking at Orange Coast College. Almost five years has pasted since screen printing was last taught at OCC and so the biggest job to date have been getting the shop up and running. It's not been easy as I have had to deal with issues that range from the wiring in the room, installation of new equipment and what now seems to be constant breaking of the old equipment. The photo is an image of the studio earlier this fall as I started working on it. We are now in week five of classes and the students are happy printers!

As with any new job, the position is keeping me busier than imagined it would as I adapt to the college and its inner workings and policies. Having taught part-time for a few years now, I must admit to being happy to have my own office! Complete with sassy red chairs and table legs!

Presidential Posings

Matti Allison is at it again. This time she wants us to vote on the next presidential portait. Obama or McCain? You decide at her blog Matti's blog. As she says voter registration not required just a fine eye for portraiture!

Self-Help Graphics Helpless?

The news is out. The Los Angeles Archdiocese has sold the building that Self-Help Graphics has called home since 1978. People are angry and upset, as they should be. All of the artists who have passed through their doors, all of the work made there, the community created there: it seems lost or at least dangerously close to being so.

But is it? Can this anger be fueled into Self Helps recreation, to help re-generate its vitality? To make it like a phoenix and rise from this terrible situation into something more glorious than before? That's my hope.

For more information see the Los Angeles Times Article or Self Help's website Image shown is a print created by Shizu Saldamando at Self Help Graphics

The Fourth of July

Its the Fourth of July and I have to ponder awhile on something I recently heard. Fireworks, firecrackers, bottle rockets and all the other sundry items that will be going boom with the addition of force or fire this holiday are things, well, we take for granted. My neighborhood has had three fireworks booths set up now for at least two weeks, for all of those who want to purchase fireworks. Today of course they are announcing if you buy one you get one free. What surprised me and came to my attention recently was the fact that each and every one of these fireworks are still made by hand in China. Isn't it strange to think that someone across the world worked for days filling the paper cartridges that will be ignited and exploded for our national celebration tonight? The thought humbles me for some reason, perhaps because it shows how interconnected we are all, whether we want to realize it or not. How someone else worked so hard for a moment we might easily forget. Rather poignant isn't it?

Clare Graham

Most people who have a grandfather or older uncle may remember garages or workshops full of glass jars full of old nails, screws, bolts and other items that may have lost their obvious function but were still sorted and stored awaiting their next yet to be seen incarnation. Walking into the gallery studio space at Moryork that belongings to Clare Graham reminded me of such sights. However, unlike my grandfather whose shelves of bent nails were never used, Clare is an avid collector who gives amazing form and so new life to the items he collects. Buttons are formed into chandeliers, the pop tops from soda cans into massive hanging sculptures, and yardsticks into functional furniture. Clare mentioned that he personally collects these items and like most collectors once friends and family hear of his newest obsession they collect these items for him as well. The key is what he does with these various objects once his collections reaches a critical mass point when he has enough of one thing to create something new out of it. Clare’s work has an old world charm, perhaps its in the way he takes these items that are refuge for most of us twenty-first century consumers and make them in to art, a throw back to times were each and every object had a function that outlived its original source. Coupled with the sheer amount of obsessive handwork, I walked away in awe at each and every spectacular piece.

The gallery is open for the Northeast Los Angeles/Highland Park Art Walk the second Saturday of each month.

Contemporary Ruin

Also opening this weekend is another printmaking exhibition. This time at the California Center Museum in Escondido just north of San Diego. Curated by the museums director Mary Catherine Ferguson and gallery director Olivia Luther it should be a show worth checking out. By the way did I mention three of my prints are in the show?

The statement from the curators:

From age to age...the crash of ruin fitfully resounds. William Wordsworth

In their inherent aesthetic, emotional or inquisitive appeal, the vestiges of ruin and decay contain, for each of us, a certain level of fascination. A ruin, whether it is architectural, human or environmental, often triggers a stirring experience. These experiences can include the recognition of the uncomfortable signs of mortality or feelings of nostalgia. In its apparent familiarity, or unfamiliarity, a ruin often causes one to feel a level of comfort or discomfort, as one ends up confronting the nostalgia of what could have been or has not yet happened. For this exhibition, members of the Los Angeles Printmaking Society explore the stunning, uncomfortable and sometimes unpleasant aspects of the ruins of our contemporary society.

Print Matter(s) Exhibition Artists: Peter De Pelsmacker and Cathy Weiss

In my last installation regarding the artists in the Print Matter(s) exhibition, I am focusing on two artists and their different exploitations of the matrix.

Artist Cathy Weiss works in woodcuts following a great tradition of artists who have used the media for its expressive and physical qualities. A close correlation could be made between Weiss’s work and many German Expressionist prints. But unlike these artists Weiss’s plays with the matrix and how she uses it to create a finished print in layers that keeps each layer separate while creating a complete image. Rather than printing her blocks one on top of the other on an opaque piece of paper, Weiss prints each layer on a ghostly thin piece of Japanese paper, creating layered prints with a sense of depth and mystery. Forms emerge as items appear above and below each other, demanding the viewer to stop and peer through these layers to reach the complete understanding of Weiss’s work. The mystery created in her presentation is a wonderful complement to the conceptual nature of her work that focuses on the often-unexplainable notions of faith and love.

Peter De Pelsmacker also takes full advantage of the matrix in his works. Creating an intaglio plate, Peter develops an installation by continuing alteration and printing of the same plate. With some similarities, but with many more differences his groupings of prints highlight the passage of time and the way printmaking can present a history of the creative process. His works seem to be both ephemeral, as they capture a moment never to be recreated, as well as concrete due to their often dense inky surfaces. Shown in a formal grid, the work smacks of minimalism while also developing a rich sense of the physiology of touch and time.

Print Matter(s) Exhibition Artists: Lorna Turner, Dennis Johnson and Judy Chan

Speaking more about the artists I have selected to show their prints as part of the upcoming exhibition at Studio Channel Islands, my focus changes a bit to artists whose work deals with nostalgia. It seems as if the reproductive potential of printmaking makes it ideal for artists wishing to capture memories or to take the viewer back to the past. As the use of technology and digital media has so easily been introduced into the printmaking world to set along side other processes this focus on nostalgia seems to have become more of a trend in the printmaking world.

Artist Lorna Turner is not afraid of technology and of using it to capture moments before the world was saturated in email and computers. Ironically Lorna is, by day, a graphic designer whose clients include Virgin Entertainment and Design Within Reach. So it is interesting to see how her prints capture her creativity and technical proficiently in their creation of a world that seemed to have existed in the late 1950’s. In a beautifully composed suite of prints, Lorna presents two main characters, an older man and woman. Parents, grandparents perhaps, this couple is often accompanied by a young girl on their journey. Maps, text, and personal notes combine as do Lorna’s design and color choices to suggest the time and place of each stop of their cross-country trip. As a viewer I am left wanting to know more and am curious who these individuals are and why they are traveling, but more importantly I have the since of a lost moment in time knowing that neither these people or these places exist in the same manner if at all today.

Artist Dennis Johnson, also like Turner a graphic designer by day, also deals with the nostalgia in his prints. Largely working with etching, Johnson creates beautifully rendered images of architecture and signage. Controlled and formally arranged so that each building or sign seems isolated, Johnson’s prints seem both sad and longing. All are void of any human presence which makes these buildings and their wonderful neon signs appear even more lonely and even more dream-like, a mirage of another time and perhaps place, if not physically certainly mentally.

Judy Chan plays with the sense of memory in a very different way exploiting mystery and suggestion to give the viewer a sense of the past and place they may not want to remember. Judy is a native Los Angelian whose has a long and extensive career as an artist and educator. Her work combines actual physical elements as well as printed items and textures to create a dark dream. A soldier’s belt combined with the image of such a belt, an actual broken clock and images of a pile of disarrayed clothes hangers, suggest displacement, fear, and upheaval. The memories that Chan give us in her prints are bittersweet, if not painful and contrast the longing and nostalgia of Turner and Johnson.

Print Matter(s) Exhibition Artists: Patrick Merrill, Robynn Smith and Melissa Kaup-Augustine

Patrick Merrill has a long history in printmaking working as an artist, master printer, and curator. Therefore it is no wonder that his works should be noted for their technical proficiency as well as their conceptual nature. Working in relief processes Patrick makes huge prints, proving his prowess as a printer and taking his images to a new level as his figures confront the viewer in a life size scale. Patrick is not afraid of presenting political issues in his work and he does so with a complex and sophisticated voice. Reflecting back to the prints of Durer, Patrick’s work is visually intricate filled with metaphor and allegory giving a reading that is dense and lush.(Note I am posting both an image of the entire print as well as a detail so you get a sense of the amount of information in this print. The size is 10'x10'.)

Robynn Smith like Merrill also deals with political issues in her work, but in a very different matter. Working at a smaller scale Smith uses photographic processes to seam together images of war monuments, victims, and items of personal artifacts and devotion. Working with contrasting images, she presents the full scene of our world, sad, horrific, yet beautiful and sublime. She gives a subtle critique of war and politics for those who look to find it.

Melissa Kaup-Augustine presents works for the exhibition that are collaborative is nature. Her books present how a variety of artists interrupt concepts such as spirituality. With a variety of imagery and page layout, Melissa, a master of letterpress, uses the book form to bind together the similarities in these worldviews.

Print Matter(s) Exhibition Artists: Kimiko Miyoshi, Sarah Pavsner, and Nguyen Ly

Continuing in my discussion about the artwork and artists selected for the Print Matter(s) exhibition at Studio Channel Island Art Center, I am writing today about three artist who seem to have an element of play as well as mystery to their work.

Kimiko Miyoshi is a printmaking professor at CSU Long Beach who has extensive training and experience in both traditional and experiment print processes. She is interested in transforming the mundane into the beautiful. I can see that in all of Kimiko’s work as she sees notices how water reacts on delicate paper, when she prints the patterns of different toilet papers, or sends flowers through the press to create delicate fleeting prints. I also see an element of humor in her work as I think the key to her practice is not only the elevation of an object and the creation of a sublime moment, but a childlike playful curiosity. Always after viewing Kimiko’s work, I can imagine her smiling and saying what if I did this…..

Sarah Pavsner's work does not have the quiet beauty of Kimiko’s but rather she presents a frenzy of energy in scenes that suggest dreams and mystical transformations. Sara uses printmaking for its physical qualities, creating an etched plate, she uses it without ink to emboss a paper surface. Once these raised areas have been established she then often paints or collages the work further creating a complex almost sculptural image. Her work has a childlike quality in both her marks but also in her images. Though often very serious and commenting on social issues such as the overuse of medication, Sarah’s work always has a dream-like feel that reminds me of a contemporary Chagall.

Like Sarah, Nguyen Ly creates prints that depict a dream like image. Working with dry-point Nguyen scratches into a metal plate to generate a print with a velvety line. A line that works amazingly well with her images of creatures, that seem half-man, half beast. These liminal creatures seem to truly occupy two worlds as Ly presents them turning away from us, both intriguing and beautiful while also dark and unknown.

Print Matter(s) Exhibition Artists: Michelle Moode, Dirk Hagner, and Jamie Ursic

As mentioned in earlier posts, I am discussing the artwork and artists selected for the Print Matter(s) exhibition at Studio Channel Island Art Center. The exhibition focuses on printmaking and the refreshing and exciting ways in which California artists are using the media. Prints are something the general public and often artists as well think of neatly fitting within a rectangular frame, but that is not always the case. As always, it is great to see artists breaking the perceived rules.

Michelle Moode, whose on-line presence is through her etsy site Millions of Happy People, is a printmaker who loves to break the rules. A graduate of the MFA program at West Virginia University, who was originally from California and every happy to be back, Michelle’s art has a playful energy to it due to her process and the artist’s quirky nature. Michelle often works with found papers, other artists trash, receipts, and of course the tea bags from the ever-present cup of tea that she is drinking. Using these surfaces, Michelle creates a dialogue of marks and images that meander and grow across the page reacting one to the other. The conversation then continues into the form that also shift and wrap across the gallery wall as Michelle sews, pastes and constructs the final piece or installation into shape, shapes that are rarely square.

Working within the rectangular format, Jamie Ursic creates monotypes that often defy the rules of what should be put through a printing press. Jamie who has her MFA from Yale and has worked as an art’s educator for the Getty and the Heart Project, is interested in surface and depth and creates lush monotypes, by inking a plastic plate and then laying items such as rubber bands, strings, and yes the jelly bracelets from the late 80’s on top to produce a variety of textures and tones. Jamie’s work varies from playful and colorful compositions that suggest the most beloved of children’s candy to her recent work done on a residency in Italy where she worked to capture the colors of the Italian landscape and the history of both its architecture and topology.

Dirk Hagner like Jamie uses a printmaking process in a surprising way. In his works, Dirk creates a composition of words, a delicate concrete poem that seems fluid and light though the subject matters are often periods of history known for their strife and confrontation. The amazing feat is that the pieces are created with letterpress, a laborious and exacting process, where text is easiest to use in a rigid linear way. Dirk seems to defy the process in some regards in these pieces, while also allowing it to give the work a wonderful antique feel.

Print Matter(s) Nancy Jo Haselbacher, Maggie White, and Eleanor Rembaum

Nancy Jo Haselbacher’s work is beautiful and haunting. A sense of mystery fills each of her pieces as it seems she is presenting something, a space or landscape or at times an object, we know or should know, but are not quite able to place it or remember where, how, or why this knowledge exists in our mind. Working with both digital and traditional print technology Nancy’s images are layered, but not dense instead each piece has an openness that reflects ambiguity as well as lapses in our memory. Nancy’s surfaces truly reflect her process and use of the printing press with passages of color and areas of subtle embossment where the paper stands up to emphasis a form or negative space.

In so many ways Nancy’s work stands out in stark contrast to Maggie White even though both artists can be found teaching at Otis College, Nancy as the fulltime printmaking instructor and Maggie as an instructor in the continuing education program. Where Nancy deals with subtly and mystery, Maggie, a Tamarind trained printer, prefers to throw things in your face, well if not literally, at least metaphorically. Working on found images with slick surfaces and controlled photographic elements collected from art and other magazine and book sources, Maggie plays a game of in your face criticism and playful art making by silk screening images of broken eggs on top. A marble statue or seventies pencil drawing defaced by an egg seemingly thrown on-top reverberates with childhood energy and reminds of items and objects do overtime fall out of favor out of necessity or disregard.

Like Maggie, Eleanor Rembaum also deals with disregard or more aptly discarded items. A lifelong educator and artist, Eleanor has been working with the concept of the layers of the city and life in her art for many years. Recently she has been working on a series of books where she is taking recycling to heart and creating something amazing. Drawn to a sculptural book form, Eleanor was inspired to work with discarded children’s books. Selecting the heavy cardboard books she sands away the previous images and then recreates the book by appropriating textures and images from her etching. Reworking these prints, she creates three-dimensional books that resonate with the energy of history from each and every process and hand that has touched it.

Print Matter(s)

Recently along with Elana Kundell, I have co-curated an exhibition that will soon open at the Studio Channel Art Galleries in Camarillo, CA. The galleries are the largest art galleries in Ventura County and are housed on the campus of California State University Channel Islands. A gorgeous building with neo-classical arches and columns that mystifies me every time, perhaps due to its elegance and the fact it was once a mental hospital. I am exciting to be filling the space with the work of other artists, my first excersion into the curation process.

The exhibition titled Print Matter(s): California Printmaking Now, presents the work of artists from across the state each using the media of printmaking in their work. The exhibition is presented as a somewhat survey giving a viewer a sense of the wealth of approaches both conceptually and formally artists are using in the print shop today. My next posts will be highlighting the work of the group of artists we selected and my reasons for including them in this show.

The Wondercommon

I had the wonderful opportunity to see Keith Puccinelli discuss his work at Otis College of Art and Design this Saturday. There are times when you see a body of work and make an assumption about the artist and this was definitely the case for me. The eccentric nature and dark humor of the exhibition had me imagining an artist that was anything but a somewhat shy middle-aged guy wearing khaki's, smart brown shoes and a comfortable black fleece pull-over. But alas I must admit, that I know better than to make such assumptions (Knowing that some could of course say the same thing about me and my art, as of course one can not judge a book by its cover.) and once Keith spoke I knew that this certainly was his work and why. In discussing his work Keith showed his humor and his seriousness and how both intertwined in his work. A sense of superb craft and full-fledged and never ending curiosity seemed to be the main stays of his artistic practice while his ideas dealt with issues of his own personal health and morality as well as the present war and its issues. An awareness of current political issues and an isolation into nature for materials and reflection both equally existed in his work. The infusion of humor, albeit dark, kept the work fresh and approachable, as did the range of imagery and techniques shown in the Wondercommon. Its definitely a show to see again and again.