THE PRINT CLUB OF ROCHESTER 85th MEMBERS JURIED EXHIBITION
Echoes of the Past June 6–August 12, 2016
University Gallery Rochester Institute of Technology Rochester, New York
The Print Club of Rochester
an organization devoted to fine art printmaking
The Print Club of Rochester
an organization devoted to fine art printmaking
85TH ANNIVERSARY EXHIBITION
To celebrate the Print Club of Rochester's 85th Exhibition year, members selected a print from the archive from which to be inspired when creating their own pieces. The original and the response are displayed side-by-side on the pages that follow. Echoes of the Past reflects the ongoing efforts of the Print Club of Rochester to recognize a paradigm shift in how prints are considered. The Print Club supports technical evolution and the continual expansion of the definition of print media. The 15 selected participants in this exhibition have employed a variety of techniques in order to create a dialogue between the concrete historical past and a new image that represents a hybridized recontextualization of the image in the present— the past is a constant reflection of the future and the present is where the two intersect.
The Print Club of Rochester
an organization devoted to fine art printmaking
The Print Club of Rochester
an organization devoted to fine art printmaking
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TA B L E O F C O N T E N T S
PAGE
Introduction
2-3
Table of Contents
Exhibition Juror
4-5
Ellen Heck
ARCHIVE PRINT
PRINTMAKER
Julius John Lankes 1934
6-7
Maria Victoria Savka
Thomas Nason 1936
8-9
Sidonie Merkel Roepke
Rockwell Kent 1946
10-11
Alan Singer
Allen Lewis 1947
12-13
Elizabeth King Durand
John Menihan 1953
14-15
Eileen Feeney Bushnell
Thomas Bewick 1959
16-17
Adam Werth
Dorothy Lathrop 1968
18-19
Elizabeth Andrews
Robert Marx 1978
20-21
Rebecca Lomuto
Joseph Scheer 1994
22-23
Linda Condon
Paul Resika 1999
24-25
Dale Klein
David Row 2002
26-27
Kristine Bouyoucos
Charles Hewitt 2004
28-29
Heather Swenson
Chunwoo Nam 2005
30-31
Marchelo Vera
Dan Welden 2010
32-33
Lorenzo Rodriguez Tripi
Karen Kunc 2012
34-35
Barbara McPhail
About the Print Club
36-37
About Prints
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EXHIBITION JUROR
ELLEN HECK
T
he exhibition was juried by printmaker, Ellen Heck.
Working in her North Carolina studio, Heck uses multiple processes in her print-based projects which often focus on themes of identity. She has degrees in printmaking and painting from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and in philosophy from Brown University. A recipient of the 2014 Victoria & Albert Prize at the International Print Biennale, Heck is represented by
Wally Workman Gallery (Austin), Groveland Gallery (Minneapolis), Davidson Galleries (Seattle), and Kala Art Institute (Berkeley). Juror Ellen Heck noted, The quality and diversity of printmaking techniques presented by this group of artists honors the past through both allusion and innovation.
It’s a stimulating project with collaboration taking place at all stages from conception to installation. I look forward to experiencing the synergy of contemporary artists and their historical inspirations in the new prints created for this unique, process-based exhibition.
Using archival material as a springboard, members of the print club are able to refocus content, renew motifs, and expand processes in their own work.
Ellen Heck | The Inking Table | 22 x 23 inches | 2015 4
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1934 Julius John Lankes Elm Tree in Aurora Wood Engraving on Japanese Vellum 8.25 x 6 inches Printed by Canfield and Tack Edition of 80 Prints Unavailable
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Julius John Lankes (1884–1960) was born in Buffalo, New York. After graduating from the Buffalo Commercial and Electro-Mechanical Institute in 1902, he worked as a draftsman. Lankes continued his art studies at the Art Students’ League of Buffalo and the Boston Museum of Fine Arts. His work was primarily in woodcut and was heavily influenced by the Arts and Crafts Movement and William Morris.
Lankes was an illustrator, artist, author and college professor at Wells College in Aurora, New York. He illustrated works for many authors including Robert Frost, Sherwood Anderson and Beatrix Potter. Many museums and institutions, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, have collected his prints.
I enjoy creating work that is compositionally balanced and harmonious as well as playful. My work is created through experimentation of various printmaking techniques in order to tell the viewers a narrative.
2016 Maria Victoria Savka Nothing is a Lost Cause Drypoint Monoprint 24 x 16 inches
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1936 Thomas Nason Haddam Farm Line Engraving on Copper 4 x 5 inches Prints Unavailable
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Thomas Nason (1889–-1971) was born in Dracut, Massachusetts. He was an engraver, etcher and illustrator. Nason is best known for his wood-block prints of the New England landscape. A member of the Society of American Etchers and an associate of the National Academy of Design, Nason is represented in the Library of Congress, the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, the Chicago Art Institute and Bibliotheque National, Paris, among others.
The postcard sized line engraving, Haddam Farm by Thomas W. Nason, with its intriguing interplay of lights and darks, captures a bleak sense of time standing still. The bulging barn and curious outbuildings bunched together in a puzzle-like formation invited a purposeful exploitation.
This ultimately lead to a simplification of the shapes on a much larger scale, creating a more crowded visual environment than that of the diminutive original work which holds such a preciousness in its detail. The ghostly echoing abstraction of the buildings are meant to overwhelm the space within the frame.
2016 Sidonie Merkel Roepke Haddam Farm Redux Monoprint on Rice Paper 18 x 24 inches
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1946 Rockwell Kent Adirondack Cabin Lithograph 12.5 x 9.5 inches Prints Unavailable
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Rockwell Kent (1882–1971) was born in Tarrytown Heights, New York. He studied architecture at Columbia University. Beginning at age 15, Kent studied painting with a series of well-known painters and teachers. He became a master painter and printmaker, as well as an author and illustrator. Rockwell traveled to remote parts of the world, which provided material for his drawings and books.
Kent’s books and illustrations made him world famous and his work is in many major museums and collections.
My choice of the 1946 Rockwell Kent print Adirondack Cabin had a dynamic impact on me as I worked out my interpretation of this composition, using mathematical models for the forms wrapped in colorful abstract patterns that I devised. My monoprint combines watercolor and digital image making placed on acetate and then transferred under the pressure of my etching press onto moist hot press Fabriano paper.
I have been engaged as a printmaker for almost fifty years and I teach these techniques as a Professor in the School of Art at R.I.T.
2016 Alan Singer After Rockwell Kent Transfer Monoprint using Digital and Watercolor Transfers 22 x 30 inches
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1947 Allen Lewis Design with Tree and Horse Line Engraving on Copper 5 x 7 inches Prints Available from the Archive
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Allen Lewis (1873–1957) was born in Mobile, Alabama. He studied in Paris at the Academie Colarossi and in 1900, his etchings were accepted into the Paris Salon. Lewis returned to New York in 1902, where he continued his printmaking and showed his work at gallery 291, owned by Alfred Steiglitz. Lewis was elected a member of the National Academy in 1935 and also held membership in the Chicago Society
of Etchers and the American Institute of Graphic Arts. He was a prolific book illustrator and printmaker. Allen Lewis’s work is represented in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Yale and Harvard University Libraries and the Prague.
My response to the colors, textures and atmospheric effects of the landscape is best portrayed through the subtle and changeable techniques of the etching process. Printmaking techniques that build up layers, textures and veils of color all combine to achieve a look that references the natural world.
Using various plates that I have created, a unique image can be etched, inked and embossed to create a unique and original monoprint.
2016 Elizabeth King Durand Tree and Horse ImageOn Intaglio, Stencil, Chine Colle and Trace Monotype 7 x 17 inches
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1953 John Menihan The Net Color Serigraph on Paper 17 x 10 inches Prints Available from the Archive
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John Menihan (1908–1992) was born in Rochester, New York. Educated in business, Menihan decided to pursue art and was largely self-taught. He was well known for his portraits and landscapes and taught painting and drawing at the University of Rochester. In 1948, he was elected as an Associate of the National Academy and won many prizes locally for his work.
He is represented in numerous collections, including the Library of Congress, the Memorial Art Gallery and the New York Public Library.
My recent work has been created by use of multiple processes and media. The imagery uses the figure as a dominant point of reference and creates a personal mythology that arises from a contemporary critique of domesticity and suburban life.
This is infused with a love of those mundane spaces and forms that surround us and sometimes seem to dominate our everyday lives. In the ensuing clash of competing information, these images create an unintended hybrid of rationally absurd but often significantly important new meanings within our lives.
2016 Eileen Feeney Bushnell Undertow Copper Plate Intaglio, Polymer Plate Intaglio, Stencils, Serigraphy and Chine Colle 12 x 8 inches
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1959 Thomas Bewick The Cur-Dog Wood Engraving 1.5 x 2.75 inches Prints Unavailable
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Thomas Bewick (1753–1828) was an English engraver and natural history author. He illustrated, wrote and published books. Bewick is best known for his book, A History of British Birds. Throughout his career, he made many wood block prints for advertisements, and children’s book illustrations.
The Cur-Dog appeared on page 301 of Bewick’s first edition of A General History of Quadrupeds published in 1790.
The “one and the multiple” addresses the paradoxical arguments over the ontological rivalry between ones and multiples. These philosophical, political, scientific and mathematical questions challenge our perception and understanding of the constructed world around us. The work draws relationships and maps connections between the one and the multiple.
2016 Adam Werth Quadrupeds Digital Print 44 x 44 inches
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1968 Dorothy Lathrop Snow in Summer Wood Engraving 6.75 x 5 inches Edition of 75 Prints Available from the Archive
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Dorothy Lathrop (1891–1980) was born in Albany, New York. She studied at Teachers College, Columbia University, the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, PA and the Art Students League of New York. She was a painter, illustrator and author of children’s books. Dorothy has won several awards, including the Caldecott Medal. She was an accomplished printmaker.
Ms. Lathrop’s detailed, precise craftsmanship contains whimsy and reality. Fantasy and animals, her primary themes, appear to be simple children’s art but they are layered in art history, subtle observation and wit. Snow in Summer is a delightful, vaguely unsettling still-life with a real mouse, and angel figurine.
The angel has discovered she is trapped in perpetual winter, while outside the snow globe Summer and it’s bounty are being enjoyed. This is a delightfully simple image about a rather frightening idea. My etching, Summer is Only a Penny also illustrates the contrasting seasons, and offers a possible solution for escape. Or does it?
2016 Elizabeth Andrews Summer is Only a Penny Etching and Aquatint 15.75 x 11.875 inches
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1978 Robert Marx The Anonymous Child Intaglio Print 15.25 x 10.75 inches Edition of 100 Prints Available from the Archive
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Robert Marx (b. 1925) was born in Germany. He studied at the University of Illinois, where he earned his BFA in painting and his MFA in printmaking. Robert has taught at many universities including, SUNY Brockport, NY, SUNY Binghamton, NY, Syracuse University, NY and the University of Wisconsin, WI.
Marx has exhibited extensively in the United States and Europe and is represented in the permanent collections of major museums.
There is a darkness that follows loss or tragedy, that exists without being intrusive, yet quietly clings to our backs with an acutely numbing awareness of its presence. My work circumvents this sensation, dealing with unspoken sorrow by solidifying the subject’s existence through surreal imagery and deep tonal range. My images are often plucked from dreams or poetic lines in my journal that bloom into mark on plate.
It Follows… is a response to The Abandoned Child, a piece by Robert Ernst Marx, that I feel speaks to the same sort of looming emotion that often inspires my work.
2016 Rebecca Lomuto It Follows... Aquatint 20 x 18 inches
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1994 Joseph Scheer Untitled Woodcut Printed in Three Colors on Hosho Paper 14.75 x 9 inches Printed at Alfred University using a color reductive process Edition of 110 Prints Available from the Archive
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Joseph Scheer (b. 1958) received his BFA at the School of Art and Design, NYSCC at Alfred University and his MFA from the University of New Mexico. Scheer is currently Professor of Print Media and Co-director/ founder of the Institute for Electronic Arts at Alfred University. His work re-examines nature.
It has been written about by many publications including National Geographic and the New Times. Scheer has also published two books about his work.
There is a fragmentation to what seems the solidity of our physical self and our existence. Underneath the skin, our thoughts and experiences whirl together. They form strips, layers one over the other, like clay smudged with a finger over another layer of clay. The strips merge together and a form is built outwards, seeming to form a solid.
These fragments that look solid are in constant flux with each smudged strip peeling away, disassembling itself and moving on in time and space.
2016 Linda Condon Scheer Loss Serigraph 20 x 14 inches
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1999 Paul Resika Boathouse with Mast Etching and Aquatint 8 x 9.75 inches Printed in collaboration with Marjorie Van Dyke Edition of 120 Prints Available from the Archive
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Paul Resika (b. 1928) is an American painter, born and raised in New York City. He began studying art at the age of 9, studied with Hans Hoffman while in his late teens and had his first solo exhibit at the George Dix Gallery, Madison Avenue, NYC by age 19. Resika served as chairperson for the Parson School of Design MFA program from 1978–1990.
He has exhibited extensively, received numerous prestigious awards and has been widely collected by major museums including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art and the Whitney Museum of American Art.
My work deals with entropy, the inevitability of it and the melancholic beauty of it. I am specifically interested in the decaying postindustrial landscape of Western New York. I was inspired by Paul Rezika’s etching of a lighthouse in Provincetown to look closely at Rochester’s own shoreline.
Ontario Beach Park has a long history of grandeur, decay, and renewal. Presently, a diverse and vibrant community enjoys the lake. I have such mixed feelings about the development that is inevitable. Yes, the area is shabby. But, I kind of like it that way.
2016 Dale Klein Charlotte Pier Monoprint 18 x 24 inches
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2002 David Row Push Comes to Shove Etching 8 x 18 inches Printed on a Takach press Edition of 120 Prints Available from the Archive
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David Row (b. 1949) was born in Portland, Maine, and received his BA and MFA from Yale University, CT. He has exhibited his work in numerous solo and group shows both nationally and internationally. Row is currently a Professor at the School of Visual Arts in New York. He has lectured at many institutions including the Cooper Union, Kent State University Tyler School of Art and Yale School of Art.
His work has been collected by museums, institutions and private collectors.
I chose David Row’s piece because it is on my wall so I have had time to reflect upon it for some time. His clever use of simple components to create a satisfying whole, as well as appealing colors and design, added to my intrigue of “rethinking” and attempting to do something similarly simple and appealing.
Colors are always a wonderful challenge! I have used a large metal circle, experimented with inks and papers for Chine Colle, with a final overlay of digital Yellow dots. Having developed a varied series of these prints, to me, this particular one was the closest to the spirit of David Row’s print. I have used Akua Inks on Stonehenge paper.
2016 Kristine Bouyoucos DR Circles Monoprint 24 x 34 inches
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2004 Charles Hewitt The Grass Harp (Blue) Color Woodcut and Linocut 11 x 14 inches Image hand cut by the artist Printed by John C. Erickson at d’Press, NYC Edition of 110 Prints Available from the Archive
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Charles Hewitt (b. 1946) a painter, printmaker and sculptor, is a native of Maine but currently lives in New York City. He received his art education at the Concord College in Athens, West Virginia and the New York Studio School. Hewitt’s work is in numerous public collections including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, MOMA, New York Public Library, Brooklyn Museum, Whitney Museum, Fogg Art Museum and the Portland Museum of Art, among others.
Within a multidisciplinary practice of making installations, screenprints and collages I create work that is both derived from experience and invention. Regarding everyday visual experiences as research, I am extremely captivated by the simple act of looking. I combine these observations with imagined structures and shapes, referencing real spaces I encounter.
An ever-growing collection of objects and material, both found and fabricated, influences my work. Sorting and arranging this material invites the desired elements of chance and surprise into my work. Through observing, sorting, and making, I hope to navigate the influx of imagery and experiences in my life and create a space for observation and imagination to collaborate.
2016 Heather Swenson Temporary Stability Serigraph 24 x 18 inches Edition of 4
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2005 Chunwoo Nam Individual Memory Stone Lithograph 8.5 x 20.125 inches Edition of 120 Prints Available from the Archive
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Chunwoo Nam (b. 1965) was born in Seoul, Korea. He is an artist, master printer and educator. Nam has taught at the Herron School of Art and Design, Indiana University. He received a MFA from the State University of Buffalo, New York, a BFA from the University of Hong-Ik in Korea and studied Lithography at the Tamarind Institute in Albuquerque, New Mexico. His work has been exhibited nationally and internationally and has been collected
by numerous museums including the Kennedy Museum of Art, OH, the Tokyo Metropolitan Art Museum, Japan and the National Taiwan. Museum of Fine Arts, Taiwan. Nam’s triptych print is a study of identity. The left panel is a representation the artist’s shadow; the central panel represents the isolation felt by the artist in the communities he inhabits, and the final panel is an indistinct self-portrait.
21st Century civilization allows a glimpse into the progressive art paradigm that encompasses our constantly transforming technological advancements. My work is a reaction to my life experiences and reflects my interests in the synthesis of media, history, and technology. I explore society through traditional and digital methods that constantly push me to alter my surroundings and visual language. I am interested in the global network of our modern times and
the interrelated possibilities within it. I produce artwork that utilizes generative elements and formulas found in nature, while being inspired by universal symbolism, conditions of the ruin, and ideas stemming from the realm of unconscious thought. My contemporary printmaking and design methods create abstract environments and imagery that explore identity, culture, and an evolving reality within an age of Digitalism.
2016 Marchelo Vera Paralleled. Intertwined. Linked. Serigraph, Digital Print and Chine Colle 20 x 20 inches
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2010 Dan Welden Connection Solarplate Etching 9.75 x 7.75 inches Edition of 85 Prints Available from the Archive
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Dan Welden (b. 1941), an American artist, received his B.A. and M.A in Art Education from Adelphi University, N.Y. After studying printmaking in Munich, he returned to the U.S and taught at several colleges and universities in the New York area, including State University at Stony Brook and Long Island University. Throughout his career as a master printmaker, painter, educator and author, Welden exhibited extensively both nationally and internationally. Concerned with
health and safety in the printmaking environment, Mr. Welden developed the Solarplate process in 1971 and is co-author of Printmaking in the Sun. He has served as president of Society of American Graphic Artist and is director of Hampton Editions, Ltds, in Sag Harbor, Long Island. His work is in many public and private collections including the Baltimore Museum of Art, Portland Museum of Art, OR and Temple University, Philadelphia PA among others.
I see printmaking more or less as sculptural. Basically the matrices in printmaking are sculpture and creating a print (image) from this is the challenge. Working with different matrices I try to integrate the new and old methods in my work.
The results can be a visual springboard that launches the viewer to new emotions and/or social ideas. In the end we see what we see or want to see.
2016 Lorenzo Rodriguez Tripi SHKEEVE Linoleum Cut and Chine Colle 24 x 24 inches
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2012 Karen Kunc Glacial Moment Color Woodblock 13.75 x 10 inches Edition of 100 Prints Unavailable
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Karen Kunc (b. 1951), an American printmaker, was born in Omaha, Nebraska. She received her BFA from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and MFA from Ohio State University. Karen has been a Professor of Art at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln for many years, as well as a visiting Professor/Artist at colleges in the U.S., Japan, and Iceland.
She has received countless prestigious awards and is in the collections of museums and institutions, including the Museum of Modern Art, the Smithsonian, and the J. Paul Getty Museum.
Karen Kunc’s Glacial Moment, as I interpret it, responds to climate change. In creating Fire and Ice, I equate how similar the physical shapes of icicles and fire are. Robert Frost, in his poem by the same name, poses fire as desire and ice as hate, and in real life, desire and hate battle it out in all political, social, and economic arenas. This monotype refers to our planet in the universe and how special Earth is. The image has a rosy aura around
the center bluish circle, a hopeful representation. Textured geological samples of the beyond spin around the center, suggesting that we are part of a greater, larger idea. The colors present a positive viewpoint, even with mounting evidence that we humans may self-destruct. The image, printed in small squares, and joined like a quilt, is a reminder of the multi-faceted layers of the environmental issues, and the need to work out a unified solution.
2016 Barbara McPhail Fire and Ice Monotype 25 x 25 inches
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ABOUT PRINTS
ORIGINAL PRINT An image produced from a surface that may be a metal plate, stone, wood block, linoleum or silkscreen. The images are often produced in multiples, called editions. REPRODUCTION A print that replicates an image that already exists in another medium, such as a painting or drawing. PLATE A flat surface on which an image is incised, engraved, or eroded by an acid. A plate may also be built up to create the image as with collographs. TYPES OF PRINTS: CHINE COLLE A technique in which a lightweight paper, like Japanese rice paper, is adhered to a heavier backing through a printmaking press. Lightweight papers may be added for the ability to capture fine detail, or to create texture or color in a print. Chine colle is typically combined with other printmaking processes. COLLAGRAPH A print created by using a collage to transfer ink. The image is created using a variety of textural materials that have been glued to a plate. When dry, the plate is inked and printed using either relief and/or intaglio methods.
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DIGITAL PRINTS A print created digitally with a computer as the artist’s tool. The image is often printed using a high-resolution ink jet printer. Digital prints may also be combined with other traditional methods. INTAGLIO A print developed on a metal plate, usually copper or zinc. The image is incised or etched with acid into the plate, creating grooves or pits. Although ink is applied to the entire plate, the surface is wiped clean, leaving ink only in the recessed areas. An etching press is used to transfer the inked lines to damp paper. Intaglio techniques include drypoint, aquatint, engraving and mezzotint. INTAGLIO-TYPE A print created using non-toxic processes that utilizes light-sensitive photopolymer film adhered to a plastic or metal plate. Imagery can be created using traditional painting or drawing techniques on transparent Mylar or may be computer generated. The plate is then exposed to light after which it is etched using non-toxic chemicals. It is inked and printed using conventional printing methods. LITHOGRAPH A process that uses a flat surface and the natural repellant properties of oil and water to produce an image. The surface of a lithographic stone or metal plate is chemically treated so that the image area attracts ink and repels water. The stone or plate
is wiped with water, rolled with ink that sits only on the image area and printed on a press. Because the printing surface remains flat, lithography is sometimes referred to as a planographic technique. MONOPRINT A print made using an existing etched plate with additional ink manipulation on the surface of the original or secondary plate. Each monoprint impression is considered an original because it would be impossible to manipulate the inked plate the same way twice.
THE PRINT CLUB OF ROCHESTER
ABOUT The Print Club of Rochester is an organization devoted to preserving and exploring the fine art of printmaking. Club members, ranging from printmakers to collectors to enthusiasts, all share an appreciation for the aesthetic of the medium and its ability to produce images in multiples.
HISTORY Founded in 1930, The Print Club of Rochester has an over 80-year love affair with the fine art of printmaking and prints. Originally established by 22 print-lovers, the club has continued and grown into one of the longest continually running print clubs in the United States. Today the club is committed to the encouragement of traditional and contemporary methods of printmaking. We look forward to a future of new ideas and directions in printmaking.
MISSION STATEMENT To stimulate interest in, and appreciation of, old and contemporary prints; to promote education in respect to them, to encourage the ownership of good prints; and to assist in the production of prints.
MONOTYPE A planographic process where the surface of the plate is rolled, painted or scraped with ink to create the image. The ink is transferred to paper by applying pressure. Very little ink is left after the initial printing, thus making each print unique and one of a kind. RELIEF PRINT A print developed on a wood or linoleum block. The block is carved away using knives, gauges or chisels, leaving the image as the raised surface. The plate is rolled with ink and printed. SERIGRAPHY A process through which a squeegee is used to press ink through a silk or nylon mesh or screen stencil onto paper or other substrates. It is commonly referred to as silkscreen.
The Print Club of Rochester
an organization devoted to fine art printmaking
The Print Club of Rochester
an organization devoted to fine art printmaking BOARD OF DIRECTORS President Adam Werth | Vice President Heather Swenson | Secretary Kurt Pfeiffer | Treasurer Barbara McPhail | Membership Katherine Baca-Bielinis Webmaster Pete Dailor | Trustees Jihwan Park | Jeffrey Sherven | Lorenzo Rodriguez Tripi | Claudia Mejia Willett For questions or membership information, please contact www.printclubofrochester.org ©2016 The Print Club of Rochester
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