The PRINT Gallery : The Inaugural Edition
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Who is a printmaker?
The answer may not be obvious, but we are all printmakers. Anytime you transfer an image intentionally or unintentionally from one surface to another you are making a print. Whenever you use a rubber stamp, a carved potato stamp, make a photocopy, or leave a lip stick kiss behind you are creating a print. It really is that simple to be a printmaker. Although, based on these simple printing approaches, contemporary printmakers often grapple with technical challenges and far more complex printing processes. Printmaking has a heavy process component to it and requires the artist to work through many steps to achieve the final print or edition. Each step of the process allows the printmaker to interact with the printing materials leading to prints that combine expected and surprisingly unexpected elements with the final print. It is the extra steps during the printing process, between making the plate and printing it, that offers space to be creative and to develop conceptually. The surface, the ink, the layers, the technical process become intrinsic to the art and the artist. It is this full undertaking that establishes the printmaker as an artist. Using a plate/matrix is the same as using a paintbrush or pencil. It is an artist’s tool. The artist has the added advantage of multiplicity; the ability to easily create repetition in their work. Unlike with mass produced images, the matrix is re-worked for each print and each print is considered a separate artwork, numbered and signed by the artist creating a limited edition. Each print can be made to resemble as close as possible the first print or each print can be unique, a variable print. Or the artist may make a larger piece utilizing all the prints, maybe in a grid form. |
How is printmaking valid in the contemporary artworld?The ‘print’ can be considered an anti-elitist, democratic distribution of art. The anti-white cube. Very timely in this growing time of on-line galleries and social distancing. The democratic nature of the print makes the resulting art easier to distribute to the masses and more affordable, more available. Thus PRINT'S motto: PRINT FOR THE MASSES Printmaking lends itself to reiteration by using a plate (matrix) providing the advantage of multiplicity, easily creating repetition in their work. Much like a painter's brush or pencil, the plate is an artist's tool providing the ability for unlimited images. Unlike mass produced images, the plate is re-worked for each print and each print is considered a separate artwork, numbered and signed by the artist creating a limited edition. Each print can be made to resemble as close as possible the first print or each print can be unique, a variable print. Or the artist may make a larger piece utilizing all the prints, maybe in a grid form. New technologies have brought about a lot of changes for printmakers. One big change has simply been more choice for materials. For instance, printmakers have moved from printing on the traditional rag paper to almost anything as a surface that will take an image. Printing plates are no longer just copper or zinc as artists use plexiglass, UV sensitive solar plates, and foil. Digital printing has opened an entire new avenue in printmaking and has become a routine approach to printmaking for many contemporary artists. It is a very exciting time to be a print artist as there are so many varieties of materials, approaches, and formats for printmaking today. Images by Neah Kelly, 2020. A screenprint is used to create the finished sculpture which is presented on acrylic versions of the original 2D forms that the sculptures are derived from. |
Neah KellyTo see more of Kelly's sculptural work, prints, and books, visit her website, neahkelly.com and follow her on instagram, @neahkelly
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Cecelia Press Studio
Tucked away in the Burnside Community of Victoria is Cecelia Press Studio. The studio is owned and operated by Lorraine Douglas and Susan Underwood and houses a Takach floor etching press names "Cecelia." Cecelia Press Studio hosts a variety of workshop, holds an annual Open House around the Christmas holidays, and is a must-see studio on the Bridge Studio Crawl , November 20, 2020.
Kilter by Lorraine Douglas Etching and aquatint
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Swing Time by Susan UnderwoodMonoprint
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Write Right VII by Dave Skillinglinocut relief print
Susan Underwood pulling a print at Cecelia Press Studio.
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Sign up for the PRINT newletter to keep up with PRINT events and find out about the next edition of PRINT gallery and the Island PRINT exchange.
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Resource Recommendations
Take a virtual tour of Homebody: New Prints 2020/Winter, an exhibition featuring 31 artists from Australia, Canada, Portugal, Ukraine, the United Kingdom, and the United States whose work explores relationships between personal and domestic structures. contemporary printmaking now showing at the International Print Center New York. IPCNY’s New Prints Program is a biannual, juried open call for prints and print-based work that captures current voices and issues in contemporary printmaking.
If you are looking for a good read on contemporary printmaking a great place to start is Bill Flick's and Beth Brabowski's 2009 book, Printmaking, A Complete Guide to Materials and Processes. There is a copy at PRINT should you like to stop by when we can all meet in-person again and visit.