When We Get To The End..

...He wants to start all over again.   The first of four planned woodcuts combining the themes of Photo booth pictures and Kabuki finished with a small edition of 10 yesterday.  The black line carved key block combined with five color blocks and a solarplate photogravure to make this image.

The piece started here.

I mentioned in a previous post how this idea originated. Expanding on the premise; in a photobooth we change our pose a bit and mug for the camera a bit to get our moneys worth in four poses; by doing so we expose different ideas of ourselves.  We evolve a small play about our personality; a little action sequence that if the camera shot video it might make a GIF or a Vine.

Over the course of making the first print I thought of how it relates to our constructed identities on social media platforms.  Facebook and Tumblr are image gardens where we curate what others see of us while simultaneously 'others' have become the entire connected world. In the days before the camera we depended on the artist to construct those images and personas and in Japan ukiyo-e provided images of the pop cultural icons of their day, the Kabuki actors.

I have three images left on my photobooth strip and have to decide where to start on the second in this series.


Looking at both my expressions and some of my favorate portrayals of theater, I try to match the expression with some theatrical elements of Kabuki found in master prints.



The top image seems to be satisfied or content, perhaps the expression of a scribe or scholar pleased with his lesson, or if I'm being grandose,  the look of Wo Yong from the 14th century Chinese novel, Water Margin pictured below.

In the middle is perhaps the stage stare of Nakazō Nakamura II, an actor who made an exaggerated frozen stare his signature.

Wu Yong

The top most picture was inspired by some really wild hair that characterizes prints by one of my favorite artists of ukiyo-e,  Kuniyoshi.  I can imagine a whole tradition of hair carving specialists evolving from his work.  It demanded a well honed knife and two days of patience for my attempt.

Now that I'm in practice I'll start with the bottom image because another set of hair has caught my eye.  Kuniyoshi's ambitious sounding One Hundred Heroic Generals in Battle at Kawanakajima, Shinano Province (of which there are perhaps only 12 actual works) contains one called Sixteen Year-old Warrior Sanada Masayuki.  

While it's not technically a kabuki performance I'll take some liberties as Kuniyoshi did.  I like the tilt of the head and facial expression.  I also like the feeling of the piece; the slightly apprehensive yet determined look of a young man with a challenge before him. 

That 1000 yard stare that I have in the bottom photo seems like a good place to start constructing my "behind the closed curtains of a photobooth" identity for image number two in the series.  I'll begin by seeing if I can translate some of that great hair, bulging eyes and the droopy grimace and finish with some theatrical props from the personal kabuki I call my life.

Sixteen Year-old Warrior Sanada Masayuki.  Kuniyoshi  c1845-6

The Printmakers Kabuki

The Key Block after proofing.

Among the pieces in progress in my studio is Photobooth Kabuki, first in a series of four that I'm producing based on combining a photobooth strip of self portraits and kabuki costumes. The picture above is the first carved block; the black ink block that forms the basis for the layout of my subsequent color blocks that infill the dark outlines.

Key Block is printed over the Solarpate photogravure made from original photobooth portrait.

From my original design it looks like I'll need six color blocks so to be safe I've printed nine of these Key Block prints (plus the photogravure) that will be glued in place on the blank woodblocks to act as guides for laying out the caving of the colors.

Here's a proof glued in place with a thin rice paste.  I'm using a thin washi paper and I gently rub away the fibers leaving an extremely thin layer with the image very visible.  In the photo above I am preparing  to carve a block with red and a bit of blue on the staff.  There's just enough space between the colors that I can get both of these on one face of the block.

This detail shows the layers of the washi separating. The closeup also shows me I can refine the carving a bit to better mesh the hairline of the photogravure and the Key Block. (a bit of eye brow shaping too)

Two of the color blocks. On the left, the red and blue mentioned above and the right block is for some color behind the black hair of the Key Block.  Another four color blocks to carve this coming week before I can begin  to proof for the right colors.

A final thought for this post is inspired by this demonstration of concentration by Miyoko Shida.

As I watched this performance I thought of the feather as art and the incredible amount of details that must be in balance for that art to manifest.  Not only the alignment of our talents with our material but the balance of our time and circumstance with that gift and the will to make it happen.

FInding Art Off the Beaten Path

© CJ Nye - All the Little Cashews - oil on unprimed canvas

Caution, road trips are sometimes required to find what you're looking for.  I found some some very nice works by Caroline J. Nye and Bernard Klevickas on Long Island.  Exhibiting at a precious little gallery in Bay Shore called the Second Avenue Fire House Gallery, these two NYC based artists have presented a very elegant installation of their works.  The exhibition's title, "Source" refers to materials as opposed to an artist's influences.

Caroline (CJ) is a painter and presents several works that delve into not only the material of paint but into the nature of the support.  All the Little Cashews, (above) works very delicately with the often unpredictable nature of raw canvas.  CJ creates a variety of symbols and shapes referencing both art history, signal flags and to my eye the nature of a group conversation.

© CJ Nye - Mr. Alexander Pablo Androver - oil on canvas (photo from the artist's website)

Another of CJ's works, Mr. Alexander Pablo Androver, successfully explores the nature of canvas as a support for paint by returning to its draping nature as essentially a fabric.   Here, her playful title, a mashup of Alexander Calder, Pablo Picasso and Miguel Androver gives us clues that the piece enjoys a rich inner life at the intersection of movement and deconstructed space with a flair for fashion.

© Bernard Klevickas - Untitled (six pack) - Powder coating and automotive paint 

on pressed stainless steel with polished areas and aluminum base

Bernard Klevickas' metal sculptures also deal with the idea of "source".  From his time as an arts fabricator Bernard has collected discards and sought to repurpose fragments.  Also involved is a reflection on the nature of the steel and it's reaction to pressure as it is pressed into the wave forms that make up many of the pieces in this exhibit.

© Bernard Klevickas - Untitled (Roswell) - Pressed, welded and polished stainless steel

(Photo from artist's website)

Another of Bernard's pieces on exhibit, Roswell, shows his sensitivity to the material through the use of curves formed by hydraulic press to obtain strength for the upper part of this slightly anthropomorphic piece contrasted with the slightly springy nature of its "legs". 

Source is at the Second Avenue Firehouse Gallery through June 15 (Regular hours Saturdays from 10:30-6:30 And by appointment.  Contact: Steven Ceraso  (516) 643-2179)

Gallery link

CJ Nye website

Bernard Klevickas website

Photobooth Kabuki

Photobooth pix

Sometimes ideas for a  print is just buried there on a desk.  For a couple of years now this stip of photobooth pix has been floating around the studio; a souvenir from an opening to a group show I was in at Mobius in Boston. Shortly after that opening I played with the strip in Photoshop a bit and threw together a digital print for an artists exchange. 

  ©William Evertson - Self Portraits 2010, digital collage, pigment print 8.5 x 11

Recently I heard about Purikura, short for Purinto Kurabu (Print Club), which are Japanese photo booths that let you take digital pictures with your friends and then decorate and edit them using a touch screen and stylus.  You can add effects, draw, change backgrounds, even give your eyes the manga treatment.  See some examples HERE.  You'll probably notice that the marketing emphasis is on teenage girls and making "cute" pictures.

I thought back to my earlier self produced manipulation of a photobooth picture and decided to revisit that image at the source of manga, early ukiyo-e prints.  I'm taking one of the small small photobooth images and enlarging it and printing it as a solarplate image.  Over the top of this I'll print several woodblocks with traditional moku hanga techniques.

Solarplate

Beginning the carving of the hair.  

The image outline is drawn on thin paper in ink and pasted to the block.  

Mockup of piece from Photoshop.  I use this as a guide for separating 

the lines for the key block and the color areas for the color blocks.

Cartouche with title "Photobooth Kabuki"

Some trial proofs from the Solarplates, the mockup and key block in progress.

The working title, Photoshop Kabuki, comes from my feeling of being in a performance when using a photobooth which also was the inspiration for kabuki costuming ideas from one of my favorite artists, Kuniyoshi (1797 -1862).  Kubuki, or kubuki theater dates from the 17th century as a series of comic plays in which women played all roles.  Still popular, kubuki has the sense of a stylized surreal world.

This piece, although it's a small, A4 size (21 x 29.7 cm), it will probably keep me busy over the next couple of weeks, especially since this will be an experiment in registration with the combined techniques of solarplate etching and moku hanga printing.

Art of Armor

As the name implies, Art of Armor recently opened at Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, gives us a broad look into the aesthetics of samurai armor.  The exhibition features more than 140 objects from the Ann and Gabriel Barbier-Mueller collection, including armored horses carrying combat-ready samurai in full regalia.
Having come to appreciate armor through my love of ukyio-e prints I was aware of how artfully they were portrayed in print media but I wasn't prepared for the staggering detail observed in a large scale exhibit of actual examples. 

Kuniyoshi - The last stand of the Kusunoki at Shijô-nawate under a hail of arrows in 1348 (1857)

Nor would I have been surprised to learn that artists had taken liberties to embellish the amount of decoration to add drama to the action of a print. Nothing could be further from the truth as the detail and elaboration of each samurai's armor was a masterpiece of collaborative efforts that would difficult to capture in its entirety. 

Breastplate detail

Artisans required to manufacture these armors included metal workers both forgers and decorative, braid makers and embroiderers, painters and sculptors, in short an army of artists to make the suit of one warrior.  Each suit in the collection is a riot of color texture and the style of each is unique, which is perhaps partly due to the preferences of the curators and the original collectors Ann and J. Gabriel Barbier-Mueller.

faceplates

Some items are clearly ceremonial and some purpose built as protection or weapon but all show an attention to artistry that have helped the samurai to transcend cultural roots and become embedded in our collective consciousness.

The other purpose of the ornamentation is identification.  While rank and file warriors needed little more than a badge on the helmet or breastplate and perhaps a flag on their backs the men of high rank wanted to be identified, both to their men but also to be recognized so that their deeds of valor could be noted.  In times of peace samurai of wealth and rank could commission highly eccentric designs.

helmet

Although far removed from the era of the samurai and now subject to our romantic notions gleaned from popular culture this exhibition is certain to raise a renewed interest in the actual lives and times of samurai in feudal Japan.

Samurai - Armor from the Ann and Gabriel Barbier- Mueller Collection on view in Boston at the Museum of Fine Arts through August 4th.

m the Ann and Gabriel Barbier-Mueller Collection

Halfway to Boston

iStatic - ©William Evertson 2009

There have been more than a few times where I have been transfixed by the repetitive flicker of images on the TV screen.  All too often the electrons form into images of violence.  The events that recently transpired in Boston were just one more in a succession of the terror we inflict upon each other. Now the speculations concerning motives will eat up our news cycle until the next senseless violent act takes center stage.

All that to say for my little piece of this story, I was preparing for a bit of fun in Boston that was ruined. I was preparing to promote the art world based comic that I produce with collaborator Susan Shulman at Boston's ComicCon.

Already earlier in the week the marathon bombers had wrecked their havoc and once again our lives were altered.  People are resilient, Boston is resilient and life goes on, and with a heavy heart we continued our plans. By yesterday (Friday) things again had taken a turn for the worse with more death, a shootout with police and an entire city in lock down.

All day we waited along with thousands of others hoping that no more had to be victims in this drama. I was caught up in my own little drama of waiting to see if the event organizers would cancel. Their Facebook page was divided among those who didn't want to be cowed by the terror and those urging the prudence of cancellation in the face of the unprecedented "shelter in place" order and closing of all mass transit.

By 3pm it seemed as if the comiccon was still on and after checking with our hotel I set off for the two hour drive to Boston. Halfway there I got a text from my son; The Hynes convention center pulled the plug on events. I cancelled our hotel, turned around and headed home.  Probably for the best because my mood was foul and my heart was heavy; not where I needed to be when exhibiting or promoting art.
As most everyone know by now, the "shelter in place" was lifted and soon after more drama as the second bomber was eventually taken into custody amidst the largest police presence I've ever seen.

Today my heart is still heavy as I contemplate those who died, those who suffered massive injury, those whose lives are never to be the same because of this.

I'll got back into the studio today and begin new works of art and attempt to process the violence in our world.

Laying Track

Palmer Hayden, from John Henry series.

I recently read a story about building the first railroads. How each day material would get ferried forward and new track laid. Then the train backs up and picks up more material. Next day, start over.

Some days it's like that when I'm making art. I'm backing and then I'm laying new track this week because making art isn't just paint on canvas or ink on paper; sometimes I back up and write.

This morning as I set out to write I came across an injustice, seemingly small in our world of appropriated images becoming commonplace. I was looking through my images to illustrate the blog post title of laying track and then decided to google laying track.

Palmer Hayden, The Janitor Who Paints

I came across the picture above that was being used to promote a workshop "Sounds of American History" based on an authors book on John Henry. I searched for an attribution to the work, found none, but was just able to make out the artist signature.  Palmer Hayden it turns out spent more than his share of backing up to move forward. He focused on the African American experience with works from the urban background of Harlem as well as his (now) famous John Henry series of paintings created over 10 years. Link to Hayden on Wikipedia.

Please folks, if you are going to use an artist's work (even a deceased artist) to promote or illustrate something online, how about an attribution?

So....many days are filled with satisfying the preconditions to that studio time when you are actually at work on art. this past week was one of them.

First of all, PR and kudos for a great exhibit  curated by Cathy Nolan Vincevic for the Gordon Nash Library.  The exhibition titled, The Book Remade" is focused on books re-worked, re-organized, painted, cut ornamented or embellished. I'm happy to have my artist book, "Three Little Kittens Rekindled" included in this international group of altered books.


Curator and Head Librarian Cathy Nolan Vincevic

I wrote a blog post about the construction of the book back in March. My book was constructed with traditional hand binding techniques but made to resemble Amazon's Kindle.  That post has more of my thoughts on the distribution of literary material, our embrace of electronic media and the copyright of that material originally found in oral tradition.  The Gordon-Nash Library's blog contains the complete listing of artists. On display through April.

Preparation is underway for spending the weekend in Boston at ComicCon where Susan Shulman and I plan on exhibiting Kalicorp Art Mysteries.  Although as I write this the fallout of Mondays bombing of the Boston Marathon is still playing out. My heart goes out to those injured and lost loved ones in this horrific violence.

We'll Be at the Hynes Convention Center on Saturday, April 20th from 10am -7pm and Sunday, April 21 from 10am - 5pm.
(Email from the organizers indicate this will go on as planned - and artists are donating to the Red Cross for the Boston Marathon victims relief effort)

Gathering the promotional material for Artist Alley

Link to the latest from the Kalicorp Art Mysteries Blog

Six Blocks - Thirteen Times

 Background gradations built up with three colors

Light yellow of sail

Land mass was printed twice to get a gradation.

Sail highlights and mountain shadows

First printing of dark sky gradation

Final block printed three times for black, violet in trees and umber on monkey

Admiral He's Stowaway, image 11 x 17 printed on 13 x 19 paper (6 on Kizuki Hanga and 6 on Echizen Kozo).   This image is part of the illustrations that make up the novel and corpus of work from Analogue Narratives, an exquisite corpse multimedia work in progress.  Analogue Narratives features work by Mara Thompson, Lee Goldberg, Susan Shulman, Mark Bloch, Ria Vanden Eynde, myself and surprise guests from time to time.

Back to Moku Hanga

He's Monkey - woodblock key - image size 11 x 17"

I had to put this woodcut on hold for a bit over a month while other studio projects with deadlines took precedent.  But this image which accompanies the exquisite corpse blog I contribute to finally got some attention this past week.

Analogue Narratives is currently an online project in search of a physical exhibition space.  It began three years ago as a collaborative writing project based on the premise of finishing Rene Daumal's unfinished novel, Mount Analogue.  Daumal passed away leaving his surreal tale of the search for enlightenment without an ending.  Our story picks up on the fabled mountain of no certain location and the artists I work with contribute writings, illustrations and video concerning our own search for an ending.

Stack of 5 clear acetates with a ghost of ink remaining after transfer to the plywood blocks. 

I depart from the traditional methods of transferring image to the blocks.  After I work out my colors and the number of blocks I need to get those colors, I print each color as black on acetate and place them on the blocks while the ink is sill wet. 

The image at the top now carved - (black ink from proofing)

Block for deeper violets and lemon yellow on monkey.

Block for ochre in sail area

Block for background gradients

Carved area allows white of paper to form the snow pack on the mountain.

Block for orange/reds (almost finished)

This image began as a combination of several ink drawings that I scanned into Photoshop, combined, experimented with coloration and later separated the colors for the blocks.  This forms a starting point as I begin to work with various inks this coming week.  

Admiral He's Monkey © William Evertson 2013

Click to open Analogue Narratives

Altered Book

Three Little Kittens, altered book, 7.5 x 9.5" tooled leather cover with gold leaf, © William Evertson

In preparing a piece to exhibit in the Gordon-Nash Library exhibition of "The Book Remade" I had to make a detour from my usual bookmaking habits.  The exhibition concerns the "altered book" as a core principle; re-worked, reorganized, painted, cut, ornamented or embellished.   
I re-imagined my usual start from the beginning, handmade approach.  I began to think of the history of books, their transformative power, their methods of construction and their means of distribution.

The desire to record and transmit our thoughts to others is a major evolutionary accomplishment and the concept of book fundamental to that continuing process.  In an equally fundamental way, the means of distribution of knowledge and opinion via the written word has aspects of power that define access and control. The secrets of paper-making where once closely guarded, limiting accessibility, while  Guttenberg's movable type increased accessibility.

My thoughts turned to the most current revolution in the production and transmission of books - the e-reader.  

My piece, titled, Three Little Kittens Rekindled, began as a download from the multinational corporation Amazon.  I purchased the Paul Galdone illustrated version of Three Little Kittens for $4.99.      Although Galdone illustrated many children's books I remember from my childhood, Three Little Kittens actually belongs to no one. It began with oral roots in the British folk tradition.  The rhyme was first published in Britain in 1833 as an anonymous addition to a volume of Eliza Lee Cabot Follen's verse.   Eventually it was absorbed into the Mother Goose collection of nursery rhymes.  

Illustration from Ballantyne's 1858 version

My alteration is a meditation on ownership and transmission.  I have re-appropriate the Kindle electronic version and have returned it to the roots of bookmaking in the form of a handmade book. 

Paul Galdone illustrated version as viewed on kindle. 

Scanned images printed on Arches Text Wove

Starting with images scanned directly from the kindle, they were pigment printed on Arches Text paper, a fine art paper used in bookmaking.

The pages are collated and are sewn into two signatures. 

Spreading paste on the book leather cover.

A cover illustration from a 1952 Golden Book version of Three Little Kittens was used a basis for my pixelated version.  This was printed on glossy stock and pasted into to the screen area of the book leather cover.

The cover was embossed, tooled and gold leafed to bring out kindle keypad details.

Three Little Kittens Rekindled - an altered book © William Evertson 2013

An endless dance of a common tale that has become common property and used by authors and illustrators alike to make a living.  Once a rhyme that you could say aloud for free now exists on Amazon in an endlessly repeatable electronic format which renders it essentially free but now can be purchased for $4.99. 

Facebook event page for The Book Remade.  Gordon-Nash Library, New Hampton, NH. Running through April with a closing reception on April 24th.