The Concord Museum is Alive With Birds

The Concord Museum, in collaboration with the Museum of American Bird Art at Mass Audubon, has just opened a lovely new exhibition that explores some of the life and legacy of William Brewster (1851-1919). Brewster spent more than 30 years studying natural history on his farm in Concord, was one of the earliest advocates for bird protection in America, and was the first president of Mass Audubon.

The exhibition Alive With Birds: William Brewster in Concord includes paintings, sculptures, and a linocut (mine!) from the MABA collections, as well as artifacts from the Concord Museum, Harvard's Museum of Comparative Zoology, and the Chesterwood Archives at Williams College. Excitingly, some of Brewster's field journals are on display, and the exhibition touchingly pairs excerpts from his observations with artwork from contemporary and historical bird artists, including John James Audubon, Louis Agassiz Fuertes, Charley Harper, and Lanford Monroe. 

"Trunk Show," reduction linocut by Sherrie York, paired with 
Brewster's observations of the behavior of downy woodpeckers at his farm in Concord.

"Alive With Birds" is open now until September 2022, so if you find yourself in the Concord area this spring or summer, do stop in to take a look. The museum also has some lovely historical exhibits and artifacts... including one of the very lanterns used to signal Paul Revere to begin his famous ride! 

The September Shows: Linocuts everywhere!

I've enjoyed a little respite from the crazy pace of the summer, catching up with some of the myriad tasks that were neglected when my schedule hit Mach 10.

Some of what was happening in all the summer craziness was the framing and shipping of work for three major exhibitions, all happening in September. Which is almost now!

"Four on the Fence," reduction linocut © Sherrie York

The Woodson Art Museum's flagship exhibition is one of the highlights of the wildlife art year. Birds in Art 2019 includes the work of 114 international artists, and will honor British colored pencil artist Alan Woollett as this year's Master Wildlife Artist. Show opens to the public on Saturday, September 7 and will continue through December 1.

*******************************************************

It's my great honor to have been invited to participate in the Susan K. Black Foundation's exhibition "In the Audubon Tradition," opening at the Cincinnati Museum Center on September 12 and continuing through January 5, 2020. The show includes work by 80 of the top artists in the wildlife art field...  whew!

(This list embiggenable with a click)

*******************************************************

The Society of Animal Artist's 59th "Art and the Animal" exhibition opens this year at the Briscoe Western Art Museum in San Antonio, Texas on September 20. Show continues through January 5, 2020. Selections from the show (including my piece, Chasing Daylight) will go on national tour following the event's close at the Briscoe.

"Chasing Daylight," reduction linocut © Sherrie York

*******************************************************

Also, don't forget it's your last chance to see "Under Pressure: Birds in the Printed Landscape" at the Museum of American Bird Art in Canton, Massachusetts. Show closes September 15, so don't delay!

"Dinner Party," reduction linocut © Sherrie York

The Summer Sessions....

After a solid month of workshop facilitation I finally see light at the end of the one-thing-after-another tunnel. I've got two more short workshops coming up in the next week, but then, whew! I'll have some time back at home and in the studio, catching up with framing and shipping and getting ready to start some new linos.

The past few weeks have been great, though... a lot of time outside in the field! Right on the heels of my exhibition opening at the Museum of American Bird Art I had a grand group of field sketchers at the Farnsworth Art Museum in Rockland.

Farnsworth Field Sketchers in a friend's garden.

We enjoyed a busy week visiting the beach, the farmers market, and the garden of a friend who lives just a couple of blocks from the museum. We also spent a little time indoors working on drawing and watercolor skills.

Watercolor skill-building at the Farnsworth Art Museum

A few days after that class finished I was off to my annual gig at Hog Island Audubon Camp. "Back in the old days" when I lived in Colorado, coming to camp involved a couple days of travel on either end. Now I live 20 minutes from the camp's mainland dock! I'm still not sure if that's good or bad.

The Arts & Birding team: me, Jean Mackay, Derrick Jackson, Drew Fulton

My first week on the island was for the Arts & Birding session, which I co-facilitate with the fabulous Jean Mackay. If you don't know Jean's work, you owe it to yourself to check it out.

The photography section of our week is led by filmmaker Drew Fulton (he who made the short film about my work in the previous post) and photographer/journalist Derrick Z. Jackson.

Evening salon at Hog Island

One of the highlights of the Arts & Birding week is the evening salon. Every night, just before dinner, anyone who wants to share puts out sketchbooks or laptops with slideshows running, and lively conversation ensues. It's a lovely way to come together and see what everyone has been up to during the day.

My second week on Hog Island was for the high-energy Educators' Week. About 50 educators serving the spectrum of learners from PreK to college, schools to nature centers, came together to share ideas and experiences for outdoor education.

Sketching in the gardens at Hog Island

Of course I always make sure there are opportunities for field sketching at camp! We also make journals, and this year I even managed to squeeze a quick printmaking session onto the already-packed schedule.

And in an amusing twist, a few of the new printmakers decide their prints could translate well as temporary tattoos...

I came home this weekend, did the laundry, paid some bills, answered some email, and now I'm ready to pack a bag again! I'm headed back down to Massachusetts for another quick little workshop at the Museum of American Bird Art, and I'm looking forward to catching up with folks in the Boston area. Then it's back to Maine for a printmaking class at the Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens... at which point it will already be August! Stay tuned.

"Under Pressure" is underway!

Whew!

It was a busy but lovely day today here at the Museum of American Bird Art in Canton, Massachusetts. This morning started with a gallery talk and luncheon for museum patrons, a quick little printing demo, and then the afternoon public opening of my exhibition, Under Pressure: Birds in the Printed Landscape.

Talking prints with museum patrons

The show looks so lovely in this beautiful venue. It's the first opportunity I've had to mount 50 pieces of my work in one place, which was exciting and a bit unnerving.

Upstairs in the mezzanine my inner educator got to have fun creating an area all about the reduction printing process.

All about reduction prints!

The table case on the left has tools and lino and registration jigs... the panel just to the right of the table has photos of me at work in the studio and a description of each step of the process. Across the center are four prints from which I pulled one sheet at each stage... so viewers can see the print develop. And on the TV at right, a short film produced by Drew Fulton, which I will post here shortly.

The show is now up through September 15. MABA is open Tuesday through Sunday, 1-5pm, so if you're in the Boston area, do stop on in. (Bonus: Museum admission is free to MassAudubon members.) The museum sits on 120 wooded acres, with walking trails and plenty of wildlife to enjoy, too!

I expect you'll read more about this show later, but for now I want to extend my deepest gratitude to the MABA staff, who have been so supportive of me and my work, and who pulled out all the stops to make the exhibition look fabulous. Thank you all!

Under Pressure: Birds in the Printed Landscape at the Museum of American Bird Art

"Dinner Party," reduction linocut, 24 x 24, © Sherrie York

In less than a week I'll be loading up almost 50 framed linocuts and heading south to the Boston area, where I will install a solo exhibition at the Museum of American Bird Art in Canton.

The show, which opens June 15, will include work from across my printmaking career, including some early pieces made in the 1990s! (Practically ancient. Certainly vintage.) The brand-new harlequin duck piece, "Fourteen at Two Lights," was dry enough to frame yesterday, so this will be its first public debut! (As well as the first view of "Spring Calling," the new red-winged blackbird piece.)

Please join me Saturday, June 15, from 1:00-5:00, for the opening celebration. Show continues through mid-September.

Coming up! Intro to Relief Printing workshop at the Museum of American Bird Art

Museum of American Bird Art
(No, it's not snowing there yet! This photo is from my visit there last spring.) 

Just because I woke up this morning to the prospect of a relatively easy-going week doesn't mean it's going to stay that way. In fact, if you're in the Boston area in early November and would like to get your printmaking feet wet with a relief printing workshop, have I got a deal for you!

Intro to Relief Printing
Saturday, November 10
Museum of American Bird Art at MassAudubon (Canton, MA)
9:15am-12:35pm

Participants will design, carve, and print two small blocks inspired by natural forms: plants, animals, insects… anything! Armed with newly carved blocks, we will explore printing them singly and in combination… overlapping, turning, and repeating to discover new designs.

For more information and to register, check out the MassAudubon online program catalog here.

Lost in transition

My search for a place to live and work here in Maine continues. It has been a frustrating process, but my friend Sue encourages me to stay calm. “Maine challenges you the first year,” she says, “to test your resolve.”

Okay, Maine. Bring it. 

There have been several bright spots lately, though!

Green Lion Gallery

The Green Lion Gallery in Bath. This gorgeous space is owned and nurtured by artist/printmaker David Morgan. The Green Lion represents mostly (but not only) printmakers and artists who create work on paper. The space has a great vibe, and it has an Ettan press in the back. Dave was kind enough to offer me some press time a couple of weeks ago, and I managed to create three small (4x6”) blocks. I printed on 300# watercolor paper and then hand-painted them. I was reasonably pleased with the results AND the feeling of shaking out a few cobwebs. 

Green Lion Gallery

New linos!

Inspiration for the new images was the March 11 Mass Audubon Birders Meeting in Boston. It’s still a bit surreal to me to realize that I can now drive to Boston in about the same amount of time it took me to drive from Salida to Denver. The scenery is certainly different, and the traffic once one hits Boston is worse (which hardly seems possible), but it's totally doable. 

Linocuts all set up and ready for visitors at the Birders Meeting

The Birders Meeting is a one-day event, but I arrived a little early and stayed a little late to have the opportunity to catch up with colleagues and friends at the Museum of American Bird Art at Mass Audubon. 

Evening comes to MABA

MABA is a small museum with a big heart and a collection that packs a big punch. Part of the reason for my early arrival was an opportunity to hear Paul and Alan Singer, the sons of artist Arthur Singer, speak about their father's work. The brothers have recently released a comprehensive and lovely book celebrating Arthur Singer's life and career, and MABA hosted the lecture, book signing, and an exhibit of some of Singer's original works.

Additionally, the museum's current main exhibition is "Waterbirds," featuring paintings, prints, and sculpture from their permanent collection. Selections include work from Audubon to Warhol... bird art aficionados will also drool over pieces by Frank Benson, Sir Peter Scott, Don Eckelberry, Barry Van Dusen, Keith Shackleton, Anne Faust... and my design hero Frances Lee Jaques. It's remarkably difficult to find a centralized online location for Jaques' work, but trust me, you need to Google for images. The paintings are nice, but the black and white illustrations will knock your socks off. (The Jaques Art Center in Minnesota has a little blurb about him, but not many images.)

Nubble Light at Cape Neddick, Maine

On my way home from Boston I stopped at the Nubble Lighthouse / Cape Neddick in southern Maine. The day was windy and cold, alternating between bright sun and clouds, but I was on a mission! I had heard the Cape could be a place to find dovekie, a cute little auk which I had never seen. I identified two other life birds, thick-billed murre and black scoter, before I finally spotted the stubby little critter bobbing around offshore. I snapped a couple of photos that were horribly distant and blurry but contained enough information to later confirm the ID. Hooray!

Yes. Dovekie has entered the queue for new linos.

The next day we had our third nor'easter in less than two weeks, with our second blanket of about 20 inches of snow. Enough already!

So what next? I'm still on the hunt for home and studio, but life and work have to move forward no matter what. April 19th I'll be presenting a program at the Camden Library for Midcoast Audubon. Also, registration is now open for a leather journal-making workshop at the Farnsworth Museum in Rockland, April 27. Also in April, I'll have some work presented by the Green Lion Gallery at the Boston Print Fair. I'm also deep in image design for posters for the International Loon / Diver Symposium coming up in Portland in 2019. I may be unsettled, but I'm certainly not bored!

Print fun in Massachusetts!

It's my first morning back in Maine after almost a week at the Museum of American Bird Art (MABA) in Canton, Massachusetts. This past weekend ten inspired and inspiring participants joined me on a journey into reduction linocut; we had a great time and they did some great work!

Before that workshop began, however, I got to spend a little time working with students at MABA's Wild at Art Summer Camp, a program for kids age 4-13. They had been using pollinators as their creative inspiration, so butterflies, bees, bats, and birds were the theme for collagraph prints.

The following morning the over-18 set arrived for an intense two days of linocutting. Most had never tried linoleum block prints, and those who had done block prints before had generally not picked up a tool since high school. (Except for one who hadn't picked up their tools since they worked with me last year. Ahem. JP, I'm looking at you. ;-))

We spent a half day getting acquainted with tools, carving, inking, and printing by creating some linocut "samplers."

These were great fun, and it was fascinating to see the variety of marks and textures everyone achieved.

Armed with a little experience and some new ideas we jumped on in to reduction printing. It pleased me to watch the smoke coming out of my students' ears as they wrestled their brain cells into the world of inside-out-and-backwards that is relief printing.

The only disappointment to the weekend was that the instructor (ahem) did a lousy job of photographing everyone's work! But here are a few images that show the range of approaches, from geometric abstracts to intricately textured seascapes.

Many thanks again to the staff at the Museum of American Bird Art for hosting the workshop and to the fun and enthusiastic participants. I hope to see you again next year!

Still on the road... or on the sea... or in the woods...

Picture a window seat long enough to sleep on, one that looks out into the thick and richly textured green of the Maine woods. Now picture me, cozy under a puffin-themed quilt, laptop perched across my legs. Rough life, ain't it?

Ah, but it gets worse.

Atlantic puffin on Eastern Egg Rock, Muscongus Bay, Maine

We've been on break this week at Hog Island Audubon Camp, so I've been spending some time with my friend Sue, who is the Assistant Manager of the research islands maintained by Project Puffin. Some of our time has been spent picking up, dropping off, and provisioning researchers, who spend two weeks at a time living and working on one of seven small islands where seabird conservation projects are underway.

Eastern Egg Rock on a calmer, sunnier day

On one of these days we made the logistics run to Eastern Egg Rock, home to the southwest-most Atlantic Puffin colony in the US, and site of Project Puffin's first restoration success. The way it usually works is that we pile people and supplies into a motorboat, make our way out about 9 miles to the Rock. There is no dock and no way to get a large boat close to the island, so we pick up a mooring and someone from the island rows out to us in a small rubber boat. Personnel and supplies are shuttled back and forth, then we drop the mooring and head back to the mainland.

On this day, however, the island personnel had reported a problem with their electrical/solar system, so we were going ashore. Their problem became my gift, as I got to spend about an hour in an observation blind while they worked on the system.

The trip out had been a wet and wild adventure. The seas were very choppy and we were surrounded by rain squalls. We arrived at Eastern Egg Rock soaking wet and very cold... but who cared? We were surrounded by nesting terns, puffins, guillemots, and gulls!

Another rain squall approaches Eastern Egg Rock.

Panorama from my perch in the west observation blind, click to embiggen

Common Tern eggs

Tern chicks demanding a meal

Adult tern responding to the call for food

Laughing gull pair

Black guillemot showing off its bright red feet.

Speaking of guillemots.... this past week we also celebrated International Guillemot Appreciation Day! The endearing faces of puffins attract a lot of attention and adoration, but what about its equally important and intriguing cousin? Mark your calendars and join us next June 27 by donning your black, red, and white attire and whipping some some treats like this 7-Layer Guillie Dip.

Check out that stunning beak interior! Guillemots are something to shout about!

Up Nest... I mean Next.
Some of this seabird ogling will have to stop soon, but other adventures will soon appear. I'm off to Massachusetts on Wednesday, gearing up to present a 2-Day Reduction Linocut workshop at the Museum of American Bird Art in Canton, and then it's back to Hog Island for Educator's Week. Wheeeeeee!