Printmaking as headache cure?

After an efficient morning of errand-running I cleared off my work space, as promised. I carved a bit. Noticed a headache. Got up and wandered around. Took some sinus meds. Carved some more. Noticed headache intensifying. Sat down to read. Got back up. Whined about headache to DM. Drank some tea.

Yeah, I think I'm fighting something sinus-y. After the pace of the last few weeks it's hardly surprising. Could just be the ongoing brittle-dry air and our brief-but-intense bout of outrageously cold weather. Or it could be Something I Don't Have Time For and Don't Want to Think About.

At any rate, I finally decided to at least mix some ink and see what happened. Attention to the block HAD to be better than attention to my head.

Last time on "Snow Shadows: The Next Generation." Snore.

After the last (green) pass on this linocut I was feeling pretty wishy-washy. That big dark shape was just B-O-R-I-N-G. Something needed to be done.

After some more mental waffling about whether the next color should be darker or lighter, I finally settled on darker and grayer. I wanted to suggest some background pines without going overboard.

Does that look different to you?

How about now?

It's subtle, but I think it made that annoying green shape a little more interesting. (Poor photos again, but trust me. It's better.) Just one more color to go now. Maybe. Maybe not.

The headache is still here, but it doesn't matter as much anymore. I've got a rack full of damp prints, which is always a cure for what ails me.

Um... what just happened?

I am (somewhat uncharacteristically) at a loss for words. Or at least I'm unable to succinctly describe the last week. It's been quite the ride.

A warm weekend sketch from the F Street Bridge. 
65 degrees on Saturday! 75 degrees colder on Monday.

Someone must have finally figured out that we were getting more than our share of good weather. Things cooled off considerably on Sunday, and by Monday (when we were headed to Colorado Springs to shuffle around exhibitions) it was downright cold. And snowy. And windy. Sub-zero temps before windchill. Tuesday's drive home via the canyon was a slow one.

But we arrived without mishap, which is more than I can say for a friend who was traveling from Denver to Salida at about the same time. He was swiped by a hit-and-run semi-truck near Kenosha Pass. I'm happy to say he's fine, but his vehicle? Not so much.

It felt good to be home.

Wednesday morning, however, things went really crazy. Art Biz Coach Alyson Stanfield featured the story of the "Art Underfoot" video in her weekly e-newsletter and I was suddenly, fabulously, overwhelmed with kind and supportive and wonderful messages from many directions. Thanks Alyson, and thanks to everyone who took the time to comment here or send me an email. I'm trying to catch up with you all individually, but it's a long list!

Of course, it didn't stop there. The story was picked up by Katherine Tyrell at Art of the Landscape and Making a Mark. If you don't know Katherine's blogs I encourage you to check them out. She does an amazing job of keeping up with what's going on with art in the UK and beyond and she facilitates all sorts of connections between artists and art enthusiasts. Katherine's post was subsequently picked up at The #printmaking Daily.

New reader Robin, of Miss Robin's Art Class did a lovely feature about my work and the video got a shout in the Colorado Art Ranch newsletter. Oh. My.

By yesterday it was crunch time for a client project, though, and I ended up spending 10 straight hours chained to the drawing table. Ooph. Not my favorite way to work. Since I am easily distracted by clutter I usually try to keep things tidy, but by mid-day it looked as though someone had dumped the paper recycling bin across all three tables in here.

Wait. Is that paint on the table? What's up with that?

But now it's Friday night, and although one doesn't usually equate Fridays with a fresh start it is also the beginning of the Year of the Rabbit. A new rabbit hasn't hopped to my print jig recently so I'll have to share an older one with you. I think the lead character in this image has something to say about my present state of mind.

I'm back to that snowy linocut this weekend. Hurrah! (As soon as I clear off my workspace.)

More linocut progress

I'm feeling a little wishy-washy about this image. Could be that I'm just feeling wishy-washy in general...

Color 4, gray-brown.

Color 5, green.

I think there's a second green and then a dark to go, for a total of a mere 7 colors. When was the last time you saw me do THAT?

There's finally some snow in the forecast for Monday/Tuesday this week. Too bad those are the days I need to go the 100 miles to Colorado Springs to shift exhibitions around. (sigh) Figures. I had hoped to get this piece finished before then, but it looks like the ink won't be dry enough tomorrow for the next pass. Maybe I'll get some thumbnails squeezed in instead!

Okay, back to work.

Now that I'm done hyperventilating over an excess of exposure, it really is time to settle down and get back to work. Colors 2 and 3 have been applied to the current linocut, and of course I'm still working on the icon project and a couple of other illustrations for clients.

Colors 1 and 2 could have been applied simultaneously, but I didn't have quite the necessary roller width to do a light-to-dark-to-light blend all in one pass. This way I managed to retain a few lighter blue bits from the first pass... a bonus I hadn't planned for but was happy to capitalize on. The difference in the blues was hard to express in a photo until I shot the image sideways... sorry if it doesn't make a lot of sense this way!

Color 3 is a straightforward gray-brown, although inked lightly to keep a little variety in the tree trunks and the background-to-be-resolved later. It's time to slow down now, as the next stage involves quite a bit of "noodly" carving of skinny branches.

The snow scene complusion seems to be everywhere right now... Stuart's still doing a delicate linocut dance at Wildlife with Pen and Brush, Sonya's been creating a cloud of pastel at Sonya's Daily Art Journal, and Ann Lewis tells me she's about to tackle the Welsh winter in lino, too. Ooo-whee! I love all the activity!

As if I didn't have anything else to do this week, I started mucking around and updating my website. I shudder to think of the condition of my host server right now... a melange of altered old pages, abandoned old pages, and completely new pages. I'll clean it all up when everything's finally satisfactory, but OOOH. Messy. (Sorry, Ernie. I promise I'll tidy up my space soon.)

Linocuts on PPLD TV! The video is here!

PPLD Off the Wall: February 2011 from PPLD TV on Vimeo.

Oh. My.

Late this afternoon I received an email from Ralph Giordano at ArchAngel Productions with an ominous link.  Yup. To the premiere of "my" segment for the PPLD TV short program "Off the Wall."

I made the Darling Man come and stand next to me when I clicked PLAY. It's probably an understatement to say that I, um, dislike having my picture taken. Video? Even worse. But when the Pikes Peak Library District contacted me to announce that I will be their Featured Artist in February, I learned a video interview came with the honor. My mouth cheerfully agreed, but the rest of me went in to a bit of dread-and-panic mode. (Video. Shudder.)

Thankfully Ralph and his co-producer Lee Graham worked wonders with the limited screen charm they had available to them. They were kind and encouraging and fun to work with. (Although I did tell them I would also let everyone know they put me on a pedestal when I did my interview. Literally. I was a bit vertically challenged for the shot they had in mind. I had to stand on the video equipment's hard case so they could see my linos in the background of the frame.)

You can see other artist features on In My Eye Entertainment's Vimeo channel. I imagine "Art Underfoot" might be the lead video until late February when the next feature takes front and center. (UPDATE: The video link above now goes directly to the PPLD TV channel and is the permanent link to "my" segment.)

If you have a Vimeo account and can leave comments, please let Ralph and Lee know what you think of their work. You can tell 'em I sent you!

When the cleanup takes longer than the printing...

I did, indeed, manage to print all 18 linocut icons on Saturday. The printing itself didn't take too long, but cleaning 18 little blocks sure did! Ooph. It took the wind out of my sails in a big way, and I spent the rest of the day in a rocking chair with my nose in a book. Time to abandon the Wonder Woman persona.

I'm reasonably happy with most of the images, although there are one or two that I'm less pleased with now that they're printed. I'm going to scan everything tomorrow and send it off to the client and see what she has to say, so watch for at least a few critters to show their little faces here as they are approved. (Or not.)

You might be able to see from this deliberately vague photo that the images seem to have odd smudges top and bottom. This was also deliberate... I left small "railings" of uncarved lino along the edges of each block to support the brayer when inking and hopefully avoid too much stray ink where I didn't want it. Seemed to work. Since these are not prints to edition but illustrations to scan and have in a digital format, the extraneous blobs won't ultimately be seen. Photoshop, baby.

Of course there was that OTHER block in the jig on Friday, too.

I didn't intend to do yet another snow shadows piece, but I think I'm being subconsciously influenced by our complete lack of the white stuff in Salida this year. Snow all around us, but here in town? I don't think we've had an inch TOTAL all season. Not kidding. (Come to think of it, though... I did snow pieces this time last year, too.)

The big 16 x 20 piece is still mentally incubating, but I wanted something else to work on in the meantime. This new lino-to-be is a reworking of an image I did in black and white a few years ago. Block size is 9 x 12.

Funny. I just realized that Stuart Brocklehurst over at Wildlife with Pen and Brush started a snow piece this weekend, too. I'm intrigued by what he has going already, pop over and check it out.

RTP: Ready to print!

WHOOSH! There went another week! I'm getting wind-burn from the speed of January...

Probably my biggest accomplishment of the week was finishing the carving on eighteen (count 'em) little linocuts bound for use as wayside map icons. They're stacked on the table and ready for printing tomorrow. I'm looking forward to it... just imagine how satisfying it will be to have a drying rack full-to-brimming with the little darlings!

I made good progress on a couple of other projects this week, too, and I spent one morning helping the students of the Link School get their birding groove on. But OOOOH! The most fun part of the last few days was the arrival of a package containing this fabulous surprise:

Yup, it's a beautiful journal, hand sewn by none other than Jill Bergman of Art on the Page. Our virtual friendship stepped in to the real world a few weeks ago when Jill (the actual, real-live Jill) visited Salida. Our mutual impulse seemed to be to share books, in addition to printmaking... lucky me!

(By the way, you should pop over to Art on the Page and see what Jill's working on now. Linocut illustrations for a children's book! Absolutely delightful!)

Hopefully I'll get a chance to christen the book this weekend, after I get all these icons printed. But, wait.....

What's that other thing in the registration jig?

Linocut icons... progress!

I really need to get the vacuum in here. I just swept another pile of lino crumbs into the bin, but they're tracked through the rug and hiding behind every piece of furniture in the studio. (Ahhhh.... life is good!)

I didn't intend to spend my entire Sunday carving an outhouse (!) and a tiny jail, but there you have it. There are now 14 little linocuts carved and awaiting an adventure with ink, paper, and baren, but I've still 4 more on the to-do list for this round of the icon project. They're all just critters from here on out, no more covered wagons or grain elevators– at least for now.

January thumbnails update!

After a nudge from Lisa at Seaside Studios, I realized it was past time for an update on the 100 Thumbnails project.

You can see from the scorecard in the sidebar that I came up a little short in December. My only excuse is that it was.... well.... December. Everything tends to go out the window in December.

I'm a bit behind the game for January, too, although if this "unseasonably" warm and dry weather keeps up I might find myself a little more motivated. Sure, I can (and do) work from photos and the TV and the edge of my sofa, but given the choice between drawing from life and working from a flat image...

Oh, who are we kidding? It's really no contest.

Not that it's always easy to get myself out the door. I'm the first to admit that I can be a "fair-weather sketcher." Cold? Uh uh. Wind? Don't wanna. Maybe I should take my camera. Binoculars? Maybe I should pack a snack. An extra sweater? I don't want to get out there and discover I'm cold/hungry/thirsty/missing a new bird ID! I can spend a lot of time wandering around the house with a half-provisioned backpack, trying to get myself in the "right headspace" to go draw.

Even when I finally get out the door, the waffling doesn't necessarily resolve right away. My sit-down-and-draw self wrestles with my go-see-what's-over-there self. I wander around. I sit down. I stand back up. I wander some more. I look at animal tracks. I watch birds. I dodge deer poop. I grumble about the people who leave their trash by the side of the river. I wonder if I should be home doing XYZ or ABC.

Eventually I settle down and open my sketchbook. "It's just a 2x3-inch sketch," I tell myself, and once I start moving my pencil I realize it's the action of drawing that gets me into the right headspace... not the other way around. It happens every time. In fact, the scribbled notes on one of these pages say that very thing.

After a while my attention starts to wander again... to sounds and smells and whatever else is going on around me.  I realize that even though I dislike wrestling with ruffling sketchbook pages, it is the movement of the air that makes these drawings real. They were not made from my wind-proof studio or my climate-controlled car, but from the lee side of a fallen tree in a sunny spot by the river. I got more than a few sketches... I got stickers in my socks and dirt on my pants. I got the indifferent pip of a song sparrow, talking to itself for lack of stimulating company. I got the constant flow of the river. I got a little sunburn. In January.

Thumbnails. Funny how something so small can be something so big, eh?

Aspen linocut... race to the finish!

Okay, okay. I'm not going to go TOO crazy dragging out the completion of this image. I spent yesterday afternoon and this morning catching up (a bit) with some contract projects and am feeling a little more... erm... moderated... in how I'm moving through the week. Time to take a deep breath and see how this aspen reduction print wrapped up.

Color pass 7

All that green from color #6 was a little startling, and I couldn't wait to get a bit of ochre back in there to tone things down. Everything still seemed on track after this pass, and for a brief moment I thought there might be only one color to go.

Silly me.

Color pass 8

After staring at this a while I decided I really wanted to deepen the "shadows" between the background trees and leave the foreground grasses light. I ended up just running a 1" band of darker ochre through the area and printing again without any further carving. It's fairly subtle, but I think it added a lot.

Color pass 9. Are we done now?

So THEN I thought I was at the last color. A nice browny thing. The entire piece definitely turned out mid-day-ish, but I liked it well enough. I cleaned everything up and headed for bed, satisfied with a 9-colors-in-two-days marathon.

But, as so often happens, by the time I was brushing my teeth I thought that maybe I could do one more thing to it. I liked the relationship of the foreground to the background, but couldn't it be just a bit more dramatic? Couldn't I give everything one more layer of depth?

Color 10. Oh, NOW it's done.

Of course I could. I could go on forever... or at least until there wasn't any printable area left on the block. So yesterday morning I experimented, darkening just the left-most tree at first but in the end printing two darker trees. Yeah. Good.

So now it's finished.... really. (Although I do need a title.) Back to map icons and brook trout, bird habitats and workshop preps. And contemplating that 16x20 block that's sitting on the table. Somehow I think that will be a slightly longer than 2-day project.

Two linocuts, 19 colors, eleven days

Oh, don't act so surprised. You KNEW I wouldn't drop this bone until I'd gnawed it to pieces. Sunday's maniacal start became Monday's maniacal finish, and then this morning I decided this aspen linocut really needed one more color (for a total of ten). But since I now have to spend the rest of the week focused on contract projects, I think I'll drag out the image development drama for a few days.

Just because I can.

Color 5

Color 6

Four more to go from here.

This is one of those images in which the mood changed dramatically with each new color application. After color #4 there was a nice, moody, light that I quite liked. Less so when the yellow went on, and once this green was down everything became mid-day sunny. It was a little disconcerting, but I think you'll like what happens next.

Yeah, you're right. It's like watching a movie with someone who's already seen it and keeps saying, "Oh, this is my favorite part," or, "Geez, don't look... this is gonna be gross." Really annoying.

So don't listen to me. Stick your fingers in your ears and enjoy your popcorn. Wait. That won't work. Um. Whatever. Just watch the show.