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Google Art Project

Posted on February 3, 2011 by Alexia

Imagine Google Street View, but inside a museum. This is Google’s latest project, and for those of who, like me, who can’t travel around the world just to look at art, here is your opportunity. The Google Art Project allows viewers to explore the galleries of a museum (and there a many to choose from, both in the USA and in Europe) by maneuvering through its rooms.

You may also zoom in and view many of the artworks in high resolution by clicking on the little plus-sign beside the piece. This will take you to a larger image of the work that you can zoom in on and even read information on the work, notes and artist information.

Essentially, Google is merging its street view with with a digital art collection and catalog.

This is such a wonderful teaching tool for art historians because it allows teachers to take their students on a visual journey through the museums as well as have free access to high resolution images.

Not to mention just how cool it is!

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McClain’s Printmaking Supplies

Posted on January 1, 2011 by Alexia

I realize that I mention McClain’s on a fairly regular basis, but I have never explained what it is. McClain’s Printmaking Supplies is an online store for everything related to woodblock printmaking and engraving. They specialize in relief printmaking materials including carving tools, woodblocks, ink, paper, and sharpening tools. This is also where I purchase my Resingrave Blocks and engraving tools.

Currently owned by Alex Prentiss, an woodblock and letterpress artist with a background in library science and illustration, McClain’s staff is made up of working artists who use the materials they sell. This ensures that they always have high quality products.

McClain’s is based in Portland, Oregon, but does not have a storefront. Unfortunately that means that most of the country must have their items shipped. However, for those artists located in or around Portland, McClains offers a Will Call service at PNCA (Pacific Northwest College of Art) in the Pearl District. At $3.00, this certainly beats USPS prices!

So there you have it folks. McClain’s is wonderful. Check them out. Let it be your New Year’s Resolution.

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Registration Boards

Posted on December 9, 2010 by Alexia

Having recently moved to the west coast, all of my presses and printing materials are in storage in Texas. This is quite frustrating. However, the printing must continue, so I was forced to explore other methods for registering paper. I opted for the traditional registration board. It was an adventure, from learning about it, to building it, to using it.

The most traditional method of registration for Japanese woodblock prints is the use of the kento. A kento is a small knotch cut directly into the corner of a woodblock (and one along the side). They are used to guide the paper to the proper place every time. There is one major problem with this method however. It requires that you dedicate at least a half inch on two sides of your block for the kentos, meaning you cannot use the entire block for your image.

A second method for registering paper is to use a “registration board.” A registration board is a base made of block of wood with raised blocks attached to two sides of it forming an “L.” Before there was masking tape, artists carved their kento marks into the “L”-boards. Nowadays, thanks to the marvels of modern technology, we have a way to mark the kento without damaging the registration board (thus allowing it to be used again!). You can mark the board with a pencil where you want the paper to go, then build up those areas with a few layers of masking tape.

Registration Board Diagram

I made my registration board from a scrap piece of particle board for the base and a 1×6. I cut the particle board down to size and then cut two pieces of the 1×6 to form my “L” boards. I then used a carpenter’s square to make sure that my boards formed a perfect right angle. I fixed my L-boards in place with wood glue and nails. Finally, I sanded down the inner edges of the L-boards into a bevel to avoid contact with block when inking.

Here is the final product:

I was actually pleasantly surprised with the effectiveness of this rudimentary device. I printed my latest print, “Heian Shrine in Winter” on it first. Most of the problems with the paper registration were due to user error. Either I didn’t push the paper close enough to the taped marks, or my hand slipped and moved the paper prematurely. When I wasn’t the problem, the board did its job perfectly.

See the perfect registration in my print?:

Stages of Printing

I made my board because Resingrave is a higher material than most woodblocks. If you are using a shorter block, there are registration boards that you can buy. McClain’s sells a registration board that accommodates a 1/4 inch high block. You can even special order any size. But for those of you who want to save money and/or have the full experience of making your own, I highly recommend it.

I will definitely be using my registration board again!

To see more of the “Heian Shrine in Winter” print, click here

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An Exercise in White Space

Posted on December 8, 2010 by Alexia

My latest print, “Heian Shrine in Winter,” turned out to be an exercise in the use of white space. In this four-color print, I have tried to use the uncolored portions of the page to indicate snow. It was a very obvious choice to go with snow, I know, but the exercise was successful in creating an aesthetic composition. Hopefully I will be forgiven.

The Heian Shrine is a shinto shrine in Kyoto, Japan. The Soryu-ro, built in 1894, is a multicolored hall within the shrine complex complete with tall lookout towers. This is the building I depicted in my print.

Heian Shrine, Kyoto

Instead of a bright sunny day, it became a bright snowy day with the use of four blocks. I divided the palette into (1) red (for the building), (2) gray (for accents), (3) blue (for the sky), and (4) black/dark gray (for the key block). By dividing the colors in this way, I was able to maximize the effect of the white space surrounding each of the colors. Below you can see the stages of printing it took to create this print. I forgot to photograph the first stage with just the blue block printed, but the blue/gray stage should give you a pretty good idea of what it looked like:

Stages of Printing

I used a traditional registration board to print the blocks. This traditional Japanese method of registering the paper for each print worked out surprisingly well. Now maybe I can get around to printing the Flamingos…

The Final Print:

For more information or to purchase this print, click here.

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Art Changes How We View the World

Posted on November 18, 2010 by Alexia

Has anyone ever said to you,”All art is quite useless”? This Oscar Wilde quote follows artists and art historians around like an annoying little sibling. And it never seems to go away, no matter how many times you say, “art has its place and it helps us to understand the world around us like nothing else!” Luckily, we now have the proof we have been looking for.

Amy Herman, an art historian and lawyer, is teaching a class to police and secret service agents at New York City’s Metropolitan Museum of Art. The class, “The Art of Perception,” trains police to pay attention to details and gives them tools for articulating their observations. By changing the way law enforcement officials look at situations and the world around them, they become better equipped to solve and prevent crimes.

Amy Herman Teaching Her Class (with Sargent's Madame X)

Herman’s class ignores the traditional art historical discussions about the artists, historical contexts, or art criticism. These elements are not important for learning to observe. Instead, Herman says, “there are two words that are not allowed, ‘obviously’ and ‘clearly’.” She simply has her students describe what they think they see happening.

And the class seems to be working. For example, one FBI agent used Herman’s exercises while on an undercover mission. His new skills helped him to observe and describe “office layouts, storage lockers, desks and file cabinets containing incriminating evidence.” The information resulted in 34 convictions.

So the next time someone says, “art is completely useless in the real world,” tell them, “You’re Wrong!”

For a more detailed description for Herman’s class and her exercises, check out the article in the Smithsonian Magazine here.

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I See a Bird Trend Here…

Posted on June 3, 2010 by Alexia

It is officially summer and already temperatures are in the hundreds here in Texas. As a result, I am spending much more time inside and actually getting some work done on my blocks. Through no conscious decision-making, my next design turned out to be another member of the Avian Class of mammals. This time, however, I chose to focus on one of the most popular of birds, the Peacock.

Interestingly, my inspiration for this piece originated in the border of the design. The border is based off a Pencraft Ornamental Border design that I discovered in the 1925 Barhart Brothers & Spindler Type Specimen Book.

I am planning on vectorizing the border and putting up for download, but for now, the above image will have to serve as a place holder. It is a scan from the Specimen Book (p. 385).

The rest of the image followed the border. The border is Art Nouveau and inspired the style of the bird. The peacock is stylized, stressing flowing, curvilinear lines.

The remaining inspiration, Japonism, is only fitting given its popularity among Impressionists and other artists working during the 1880’s-1905 when Art Nouveau was popular. From April 25-May 22, 1890, the École des Beaux-Arts featured a survey exhibition on the history of Japanese woodblock prints.* Many artists, including Pierre Bonnard (1867-1947), Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (1864-1901), and James Abbott McNeill Whistler (1834-1903), were profoundly inspired by these prints and began to incorporate elements of East Asian art into their works. This trend proliferated and continues today. The cherry blossom tree in the background of this piece pays homage to the Japonism movement.

Finally, here is the final sketch for the block:

*Source: Elizabeth Hutton Turner, et al., Pierre Bonnard, Early and Late, (Washington D.C.: Philip Wilson Publishers in collaboration with The Philips Collection, 2002), 190.

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Flamingo Print Update

Posted on May 9, 2010 by Alexia

Has it really been a year since my last post?! With graduate school and my thesis almost finished (crossing fingers!) I finally have more time to devote to my art. Long, long ago I began work on a tri-color flamingo print. I can now say that I have finished carving the blocks! Now it is time to print.

I had a little mishap with the blue block and had to re-carve it. Silly me, I cut on the outside of the line, not the inside, so of course it was not going to register properly. Yet another reason why it has taken me so long to get this project going.

But hopefully this time it will work. More updates after I print them!

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A Walk through my Ave Maria Exhibition

Posted on March 25, 2009 by Alexia

Here is a short video I shot of my exhibit. It is just a quick walk-though of my show, but it gives a sense of the space, which is missing in the photographs. The space really allows the groupings I created to shine on their own and to interact with the others. The video also shows how a viewer is supposed to walk through the gallery.

[THOUGHT: You may actually want to turn the volume off, since there is no sound, just background noise and static.]

See my post below for a list of prints in the exhibition.

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Ave Maria: Devotional Prints in the Age of Martin Luther

Posted on March 25, 2009 by Alexia

I cannot believe that it has been almost a year since my last post. In the intervening period, I have been very busy and I finally have something to show for it. Recently I designed and installed a print exhibition at the Blanton Museum of Art. The title of the show is “Ave Maria: Devotional Prints in the Age of Martin Luther.” Here is the blurb as a description of the exhibit:

“Long a pillar of Christianity, devotion to the Virgin Mary was transformed by Martin Luther’s challenges to the papacy begun in 1517 and recorded in the profusion of prints churned out by newly established presses across Europe. This exhibition, featuring examples by Albrecht Dürer and Marcantonio Raimondi, explores the changes Marian imagery underwent in the 1500s and the role devotional prints played in worshippers’ lives.”

Essentially, what I did was to create a few groups of 3-4 prints each, which would highlight different aspects of Marian Devotion in the late medieval and early modern periods. Those groups are: (1) The Young Virgin’s role in the Incarnation as shown through Annunciation scenes, (2) Saint Luke Painting the Virgin, (3) The Virgin in Pilgrimage, (4) The Virgin as Mother shown through scenes of the Holy Family and Rest on the Flight Imagery, (5) The Virgin as Compassionate shown through Pièta imagery, (6) The Virgin as an Object of Devotion, and (7) The Virgin as Queen of Heaven.

Albrecht Dürer, The Virgin and Child Surrounded by Angels, 1518

The show is up from March 21 – July 5. The Blanton Museum of Art is located at The University of Texas at Austin, MLK at Congress, Austin, Texas 78701.

I took some photographs and a short video of the show. I will post the video later, but here are some photos along with a list of prints on display.

Albrecht Dürer
The Virgin and Child Surrounded by Angels, 1518

Marcantonio Raimondi
The Annunciation, circa 1506, after Albrecht Dürer

Giovanni Jacopo Caraglio
The Annunciation, 1536-1537, after Titian

Michael Wolgemut, Saint Luke Painting the Virgin and Child, from the Weltchronik, or Liber Chronicarum, 1493

Egidius Horbeck
The Annunciation and the Heavenly Glory, 1581, after Cornelis Cort, after Frederico Zuccaro

Michael Wolgemut
Saint Luke Painting the Virgin and Child, from the Weltchronik, or Liber Chronicarum [The Nuremberg Chronicle], 1493 ————>

Dirk Vellert
Saint Luke Painting the Virgin, 1526

Jacob Matham
Saint Luke Painting the Virgin, 1614, after Hendrick Goltzius

Anonymous
Italian (?), 16th century
A Devotional Virgin

: Anonymous Italian (?), 16th century, A Devotional Virgin; Copy after Marcantonio Raimondi Holy House of Loreto, circa 1575; Michael Ostendorfer, The Pilgrimage to the Beautiful Virgin at Regensburg, 1519

Copy after Marcantonio Raimondi
Holy House of Loreto, circa 1575

Michael Ostendorfer
The Pilgrimage to the Beautiful Virgin at Regensburg, 1519

Lucas van Leyden
The Holy Family, circa 1508

Hendrick Goltzius
The Holy Family with the Young Saint John the Baptist, from Meisterstiche, 1593

Camillo Procaccini
Rest on the Flight into Egypt, 1587-1590

Jan Muller
Rest on the Flight, 1593, after Gerrit Pieterz

Giulio Bonasone, Il Silenzio (The Madonna of the Silence), 1561, after Michelangelo

Giulio Bonasone
Il Silenzio (The Madonna of the Silence), 1561, after Michelangelo

Hendrick Goltzius
Pietà, 1596

Jean Mignon
Pietà, circa 1537 – 1540, after Luca Penni

Giulio Bonasone
Pietà for Vittoria Colonna, 1546, after Michelangelo

CENTRAL CASE:

Heinrich Aldegrever
The Virgin and Child at the Foot of a Tree, 1527

Daniel Hopfer I, Christ Blessing the Virgin, circa 1518-1520

Albrecht Dürer
Madonna by the Wall, 1514

Hieronymus Wierix
The Virgin Suckling the Child, before 1619

Anonymous
Coronation of the Virgin, circa 1498

Daniel Hopfer I
Christ Blessing the Virgin, circa 1518-1520

Marcantonio Raimondi
The Virgin and Child on the Clouds, 16th century, after Raphael

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Flamingo Print

Posted on May 13, 2008 by Alexia

My current printing project is a three color print of a pair of flamingos. I got the idea for this print from a photograph that I took at the Atlanta Zoo.

I don’t know if anyone is going to be interested in this bird, but when I saw this photograph I fell in love. This is not the bright pink plastic kitsch on your neighbor’s front lawn. These creatures are so much more than that. They have crazy habits like tucking one foot under their bodies when they stand. Their coloring comes from the tiny shrimp that they eat in the wild. While there are no species listed under the Endangered Species Act, flamingos are becoming rarer. This is the bird I am trying to capture in my new print (a drawing is shown below):

I have never done a three color print before, so it is going to be an adventure. I am going to have a black line block, a pink block for the birds, and a blue block for the water. I found this new water-based ink called Akua that I am going to try because I want to get a specific effect with the blue. I want to give a gradient to the blue so that it looks like it is fading from the blue of the water to the blue of the sky. I hope I can get it to work the way I envision it.