Traces, Marks, and Fragments

Posted on January 23, 2012 by Melissa

We went down to San Luis Obispo this weekend for the opening of Traces, Marks, and Fragments, the printmaking show at the art museum there.
SLO museum

The show was sponsored by the Central Coast Printmakers, and the juror was the artist Sandow Birk. I am very fortunate to have two pieces in the show. The first is Hopscotch:
Hopscotch

The second is called Freedom, and I am doubly fortunate in that this work was chosen to appear on the show’s postcard. How exciting is that???
SLO postcard

Mr. Birk spoke before the reception, talking about his jurying process.
Sandow Birk

Then the crowd dispersed into the galleries to see the show.
Gallery view

Traces, Marks and Fragments will be on display at the San Luis Obispo Museum of Art through February 26.

Posted in Art shows, art galleries, etc, Printmaking | Leave a comment

Look out! It’s a new year!

Posted on January 7, 2012 by Melissa

Look!

Here are four examples of my holiday – new year’s card. I had fun playing with color on these – different color rings, different color backgrounds, highlighting the figure with ink, and so on. It was all about play, and I hope that’s a theme that will continue throughout the year, as I try new images and new techniques.

I hope it’s a theme for my readers’ new year as well. May you all have the time and opportunity to seriously play in 2012.

A friend recently asked about this image, and what was my thinking behind it. There are many answers to that question; as I carve and print I usually keep thinking about and finding new ways of looking at my own work. But it all began here:

Rainbow on the Camino

This is a photo from my pilgrimage on the Camino Frances in 2006. We were leaving Murias de Rechivaldo, just past Astorga, early in the morning after a night of thunderstorms. A beautiful double rainbow graced the sky, and kept growing, changing, and developing over an extraordinary length of time.

I was walking with a French pilgrim, and he exclaimed: “The Camino! So wonderful! Every day, there is a miracle!”

Being the contrarian that I am, I immediately thought to myself, “Ha! Spain is not magic!” (That was my literal thought; I still remember it.)

What I meant, and mean, is this: There are miracles every day no matter where you are. We notice them on the Camino, or in any special event, because we are looking out for them. The trick –and the hard part– is to keep looking for them in our everyday lives.

Let’s all look for the wonder in 2012.

Posted in Art in General, Printmaking | Leave a comment

Postcards from the Road

Posted on December 9, 2011 by Melissa

Way back earlier this year, when I was preparing to walk the Via de la Plata in Spain, I was counting my pennies and trying to figure out how I was going to make ends meet. I hit upon the idea of a postcard subscription: people could sign up to receive 2, 5, 7 or 10 postcards – original drawings – of scenes from my journey.

I’ve been back from Spain for six months now, and because of the excitement of the arrival of my new etching press, followed by various festivals and Open Studios, I’m only now really thinking about and processing my pilgrimage.

So here, finally, in sequential order, are the postcards I drew. I am afraid the lighting conditions were not always ideal when I took the pictures of the postcards; I’ve done my best to restore the correct color as much as possible.

Seville: the first waymark, at the cathedral
The first waymark

Seville: a courtyard in the Alcázar
Courtyard of the Alcazar in Seville

Seville: the Giralda
The Giralda, Seville

Seville: the Macarena
The Macarena in Seville

My process often looked like this. A sidewalk cafe and a glass of wine are an aid to inspiration!
The Macarena in Seville

Italica: mosaic from the Roman ruins
Roman mosaic in Italica

Guillena: church
Church in Guillena

Just past Guillena: tower in the midst of fields, early morning
Castle in fields, Guillena

Castilblanco de los Arroyos: view of the town from the albergue
View of Castilblanco from the albergue

Monesterio: I felt the town needed a new stamp for the pilgrim credencial that would reflect the town’s status as the jamon capital of the world (or so it claims).
Proposed pilgrim stamp for Monesterio, the jamon

Real de la Jara: view of the town from the castle. I accidentally left this postcard behind on my bunk when I left the albergue in the morning, and I assumed it was lost. I was very pleased to learn that its intended recipient did indeed receive it, thanks to the good samaritan who found and mailed it.
View of Real de la Jara from the castle

Villafranca de los Barros: this church was diagonally across from the pension
Chapel in Villafranca de los Barros

Torremejia: Roman statues used in the wall as building material
Roman statues used in the wall as building material

Mérida: remains of the Roman aqueduct, Acueducto de los Milagros
Roman aqueduct in Merida

Aljucen: street scene
Quiet street in Aljucen

Alcuescar: odd character carved next to the church door
Odd character from Alcuescar

Alcuescar: statue “La Misericordia” in the monestery, seen from the side
Statue of La Misericordia

Roman bridge, between Alcuescar and Caceres
Roman bridge

Cáceres: couple on a bench in the plaza mayor, with the walls of the old city behind them
Plaza mayor in Caceres

Cáceres: bust of a woman on a building wall in the old city
Aztec woman carved on the wall in Caceres

Casar de Cáceres: storks on the church roof; there were dozens of them
Storks on the church roof at Casar de Caceres

Casar de Cáceres: the waterspouts around the roof of the church were quite entertaining
Waterspout on the church roof, Casar de Caceres

Carcaboso: houses
Houses in Carcaboso

Mailing a batch of postcards!
Mailing a batch of postcards in Carcaboso

Oliva de Plasencia: cat on a stone bench
Cat on a stone bench in Oliva de Plasencia

Caparra: the Roman arch. The Via de la Plata goes right through the arch
The Roman arch at Caparra

Pico de la Dueña: the highest point on the route, with windmills and a cross of Santiago
Windmills and cross at the Pico de la Duena

This marks the end of what I actually walked; I finished walking in Salamanca. I took a bus to Zamora and spent two days exploring that city, where I drew my final postcards.

Mailing postcards in Salamanca:
More postcards wend their way to the USA

Zamora: church on the plaza mayor, opposite my pension
Church on the Plaza Mayor, Zamora

Zamora: statue of penitents
Statue of penitents, Zamora

Zamora: a suit of armor as a weathervane atop church tower
Suit of armor weathervane

Zamora: a very operatic-looking statue of Mary Magdalen
Statue of Mary Magdalen in Zamora

Posted in Drawing, Via de la Plata, Walks and hikes | 2 Comments

We Voted for Change

Posted on August 12, 2011 by Melissa

The Supreme Court tells us that corporations are people. Wall Street gets bailed out, then reduces the US’s credit rating. A tiny fraction of the population controls 90% of our money. Mortgages are foreclosed, people are losing their homes and jobs. Nobody can afford health care, and social services are being slashed right and left.

Not surprisingly, people are fed up, on all sides of the political spectrum.

My latest print is titled We Voted for Change.

We Voted for Change

We Voted for Change
Linoleum block print on Rives BFK paper
Edition of 30


Shameless commerce department:
Buy an original copy of this print at Etsy.
Or buy t-shirts, stickers, bags, and postcards featuring this print, at Cafe Press.

Posted in Art in General | Leave a comment

Rocking the Mezzotints

Posted on July 30, 2011 by Melissa

Since I live with my studio, or in my studio, or all jumbled together with my studio –however you want to look at it– along with my 3 indoor cats, I try very hard to do my art in the most non-toxic way possible. So while I may re-print existing etching plates that I’ve made elsewhere, I will not bring a vat of acid into the house to make more. So how to continue using copper plates for printing?

Bring on the mezzotints! A mezzotint is a print made from a plate that has been given texture by using a mezzotint rocker. The rocker has a curved toothed edge, and you rock it back and forth across the plate.

Using a mezzotint rocker

To get an even tone, it’s a good idea to rock it in eight different directions. While this might be tedious for some, I find it somewhat soothing and meditative. Of course, since this is my first plate, I’m not working very large. We’ll see how I feel about it when I start making larger prints.
Eight different directions

If you printed the plate after rocking, you’d get a solid black print, with a lovely dense, rich black. The tone of a mezzotint is very tactile, and soft. And to get an image, you work backwards, in effect. That is to say, you start with this black tone and rub down the burr of the plate with a burnisher, eventually producing areas of white or gray. It’s somewhat akin to getting a white in a charcoal drawing by using an eraser.

To see some excellent examples of mezzotint work, I’d recommend visiting the sites of James Groleau or Craig McPherson. You can see how deep the tones are on these prints, and how magical an image is produced by bringing the light out of the dark.

Here is my plate so far:
Rocked plate

I have the idea and preliminary drawings for the image for my first-ever mezzotint. In the meantime, I’m just enjoying laying down the texture.
Rocked plate, detail

Posted in Printmaking | 1 Comment