The Incredible Print Show

I had a very busy weekend and was remiss in neglecting to mention again this wonderful exhibition I feel so honored to be part of in Rochester, New Hampshire. The Incredible Print Show at Artstream Studios is on view both online and in person until June 27th. There are 50 artists from around the world showing all types of printed work: linocut and woodcut, photos, silkscreen, monotype, intaglio, etching, digital prints, and more! All the work is for sale and priced under $400, with many available for under $100! There's some amazing stuff.

You can go here to view some of the art as well as gallery installation shots.

I can't wait to see the exhibition in person! (I will be there for the June 6 art walk that happens once a month in Rochester.) But based on what I have seen online, here are some works that especially caught my eye:

Ana Ventura


Heather Smith Jones


Stacey Durand


Helle Jorgensen


Wayne Pate


Along with five others, I submitted this work to the show.

U-Men


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Photo: CAM staff photographer (Note: You can catch a glimpse behind me [standing] the table o' zines! Click to enlarge)

On Sunday, I had an incredibly good time at the Castellani Art Museum presenting my workshop about zines called Invisible Voices: Zines as Art, to a small but very enthusiastic group. After a short slide show in which I covered a very encapsulated history of zines and talked specifically about old zine friends Emily Lyon, Sonja Ahlers and Emily Larned, we had a quite lively discussion about, among other things, the relevance of the zine format in the 21st century compared with blogs and social networking venues like Facebook. My pal Jan Nagle and I also talked about how we put our respective zine "dummys" together in a very low-key demo fashion, and the rest of the time was spent, understandably, gushing and cooing over the fantastic zines I brought along from my collection (well, actually, I brought my whole collection!) It made for quite a display spread out on a couple large tables. I can't believe I forgot to take photos! Tsk.

It was especially great because the workshop really seemed to spark genuine interest in all those attending (even the curator, Michael Beam!), which included people who had never even heard of zines before. One of my old high school friends who came said she found one zine on the table in particular that she ended up reading all the way through—she liked it so much she couldn't put it down! I think it was a copy of Kyle Bravo's These Are the Days, which definitely warrants such a response. It was really representative of the entire workshop, I think. And while it may not necessarily have produced any future zinesters, I know that someone is surely to become a regular reader of zines, if anything. I saw a lot of eyes sparkling, that's for sure.

Yay zines!

A Rush and a Push

One of the things I don't like about myself (as an artist and otherwise) is that I often find myself making a grand last rush (and push) to get something out the door (figuratively and literally, I suppose). I might have the best intentions, mark up my calendar, rough out a schedule... but something always seems to happen that foils my best laid plans.

This time around getting ready to ship a big box of art to New Hampshire for The Incredible Print Show at Artstream Gallery, everything ended up taking longer than I expected, from the making of the work to the arrival of the frames and mats I ordered, to the wiring and labeling of things... and true to my nature, I kept putting it off this past weekend in favor of something, anything else; gardening, in this case, because I cannot WAIT any longer to get my hands in the dirt and I thought that the manual labor would inspire me.

So what should have been done the weekend before did not get done until the weekend after, i.e. this past weekend. By the time I had everything ready to go, all the good light had gone and I had little if any time to shoot decent photos of the work, which was probably the worst part. Big lesson learned for sure: be MORE than prepared, be MORE than ahead of time. Always. I don't know why it's taken me so long to figure this obvious fact out.

Anyway, here's the six little beauts that are headed, as I write this, to southeast New Hampshire. (I am totally cursing myself about the documentation. Seriously.)


(All above are 11" x 14" framed: The Early Bird Loses the Day; Highway to Hell; and U-Men.)


(All above are 5" x 7" framed: The Why and The Wherefore; Suddenly, I've Got That Old-Time Feeling; Can You Hear It?.