Coordinating a Printmaker's Exchange

Addicted Collectors

Printmakers have traditionally exchanged prints since the dawn of printmaking. The fact that fine prints are produced in multiples leads to the side-effect that we enjoy sharing those extras with each other. 

As you may know, I am one of the fearless leaders of the printmaking group barenforum.org. We conduct quarterly exchanges and we are now on our happy 73rd exchange! I proudly own thousands of prints from all over the world.

Some of the prints from Exchange #72, Theme "Wings"

Bea Gold

Julio Rodriguez

Lindsay Schwartz

Martha Knox

Exchange Coordinator in Pictures

Coordinating requires some organization and much patience, here are the tasks:

-Communicate with 30 printmakers and crack the whip as the deadline nears

-Keep track of drop outs and problems

-Gather 30 sets of prints that come in the mail along with envelopes and return postage

-Collate sets of prints

-Print an information sheet with info for each print as sent by the artists and insert in each packet

-Mail the sets back to each artist

Sorted piles and cases ready

My two printers jammin...er
I mean, printing in sync

A finished set with information sheet in back,
Right hand is the spreadsheet that keeps me sane

Red line means DONE!

A little trip to the Post Office, always fun...

Stay in touch!

1000woodcuts Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/1000woodcuts 
Maria's Facebook Profile: https://www.facebook.com/maria.arango.diener 
Maria's Twitter Profile: https://twitter.com/1000woodcuts 
1000woodcuts YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/1000woodcuts/videos

A little wood engraving

New wood engraving

Out of this picture...

...a wood engraving is born!

We take the pibble-dog walking every night (and every day, and every morning...sigh) and it is now duskish-to-dark right after dinner time. I caught this feral en route to our feeders, no doubt, resting peacefully in front of my neighbor's gate. Cool, huh?

I thought so...so much that a print started rummaging through my scatter-brain. That's pretty much how they ALL start, in case you wonder.

Here is my work in progress. As you can see, I flipped the image and accommodated for the elongated paper size. Aside from that, the process of drawing simplifies the details and the process of carving even more so. What is left is the gist of the image, translated to woodcut-speak or in this case, a wood engraving. 

I am using http://www.imcclains.com/ Resingrave. Resingrave is a synthetic resin plate made specifically for wood engraving. Takes ink well, gives very detailed prints. Only drawback is sometimes the edges of a carved line can crumble a bit under a larger tool's pressure so caution is needed when clearing out large areas.

More progress, some proofs and perhaps some paper notes next post, next week.

Engraving on Resingrave, resting on home-made leather support
Also shown some tools, a sharpening stone, and honing plate
So far, so cool... 

Stay in touch!

1000woodcuts Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/1000woodcuts 
Maria's Facebook Profile: https://www.facebook.com/maria.arango.diener 
Maria's Twitter Profile: https://twitter.com/1000woodcuts 
1000woodcuts YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/1000woodcuts/videos

Tribute to barenforum.org

"We must, indeed, all hang together,

or most assuredly we shall all hang separately."

Printmaker Benjamin Franklin

Between traveling to festivals, making art, destroying my bathroom (see my facebook page), smelling the pines and all other activities that compose my very busy life, I delight in participating off and on in this rare creature we rare birds collectively call "baren". I just took great delight in catching up some of the online galleries of prints provided by the membership.

Baren or barenforum.org, is a loosely organized web-group of woodblock printmakers founded with these words: Chromoxylographers of the world - Unite! uttered by David Bull, our very energetic founding "father." His website can be seen here: http://www.woodblock.com/

See the info page here: http://barenforum.org/intro.html
Mostly we are a bunch of artist-printmakers who delight in the woodblock/woodcut process and enjoy exchanging prints. We (about 400 of us give or take at any point in time since 1999) have now exchanged prints 69 times and any one of us owns an astounding collection of more than 2,000 prints from artists all over the world.

We do this simply for the love of art, woodblock and each other. Many friendships have formed, many colleagues have come and gone, many side projects, some reunions, collaborations, exhibitions, a Facebook group, always the forum...list goes on and on.

Print Exchanges http://barenforum.org/exchange/exchanges.html

Aside from the exchange of ideas and images now taking place mostly in our Facebook Group https://www.facebook.com/groups/121864389055/ 
the highlight of our happy barenforum.org group has been the exchange program. We basically sign up, we make as many prints as we have participants and we all end up with a nice portfolio of woodblock prints from all over the world. We do this stubbornly again and again since 1999, four times a year.

Some wise quotes by our members:

"Honest effort and honest communication, that's what counts;

given that, anything goes." - [Baren] member Bill Mixon 

"It's in the doing that questions are answered." - [Baren] member Phil Bivins 

"Cut! Print!" - [Baren] member Dave Bull 

"If you like doing something, isn't it better if it takes a long time?" -

[Baren] member Dave Bull 

"Jûnin Tôiro (Ten People, Ten Colours)" -

Japanese proverb 

"... I consider this discussion about ... what art is, appropriation, editioning, if digital prints are or not fine arts, the deathly sin of using a laser or any other modern tool, etc. ... a delightful waste of time." -

[Baren] member Horácio Soares Neto

Again, here are the galleries of prints, we hope you enjoy browsing:
http://barenforum.org/exchange/exchanges.html

Stay in touch!

1000woodcuts Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/1000woodcuts 
Maria's Facebook Profile: https://www.facebook.com/maria.arango.diener 
Maria's Twitter Profile: https://twitter.com/1000woodcuts 
1000woodcuts YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/1000woodcuts/videos

Finally! Fantastic Garden is launched

Sheesh! Whew! Tons of work but well worth it, the Fantastic Garden Puzzle Print Project has been officially launched. After weeks of tweaking I just looooved pushing the bright green Launch Button.

Anyhow, we will now detour news of the project to:

The Official Project Headquarters
http://puzzleprints.blogspot.com

The Information and Sign Up Page on Kickstarter.com
http://tinyurl.com/fantasticgarden

Join us! And thank you for your support!

Dragons got lost but...

Just for clarification, I am painfully aware that LAST year was the Year of the Dragon and THIS year is the year of the snake. I actually (really) started this print last year with full intention of complying with a deadline for this very friendly exchange of Chinese Lunar New Year prints.

For more information on that, visit the amazing website http://barenforum.org, owned and operated by an amazing group of stubborn woodcut and woodblock printmakers who have stuck together through the years. This (or should I say, last) print completes the cycle of 12 Chinese Lunar New Year prints that have crossed the world every year since one of our major instigators, Julio Rodriguez, started the whole mess.

In any case, here is my very late Year of the Dragon print, a wood engraving. BTW I have banned myself from further participation in any exchanges until I get my head out of...er, the sand...when it comes to deadlines, anyway.

Dragon Valley by Maria Arango

Print Title: Dragon Valley
Paper Dimension: 7 x 8 inches
Image Dimension: 5 x 6 inches
Block: Boxwood round
Pigment or Ink: Daniel Smith Traditional Black
Paper: Stonehenge Natural
Edition: 100
Comments: Finished a year late, dragons...snakes...same thing with or without legs, no?
Lest anyone thinks I made up these rock formations, I include a picture of the actual unretouched Dragon Valley, my personal name for a nameless view of rock outcroppings.
The actual location is the indomitable and beautiful Valley of Fire State Park, a short drive from Las Vegas Nevada.
this is a standard engraving with free use of traditional engraving tools and a rotary tool with dental bits. Printed with a mini-hydraulic press.

Here is the picture of the "real" dragon valley:


Dragon Valley, Valley of Fire, Nevada photo by Maria Arango

My prints are going out today if I have to sit on my butt and lick stamps all day, by golly. Better late than never?