I was pretty excited to make this print when I first sketched it out. If you’ve seen much of my previous prints you’ll notice I don’t venture from one color designs (that one color being black, of course.) I’m slowly trying to change that. Considering most of my other works from other disciplines utilize color pretty well, it never really made the leap to my printmaking works. That could be for a number of reasons.

First, when I started printmaking all so many years ago, I started simple, like all good students in high school. Just managing not to cut yourself on dull tools was challenge enough for this medium which was unlike anything most people at that age were used to. The more I got into it, the more I started to “think in black and white”. I started to consider positive and negative shapes, balancing darks and lights, achieving tonal and textural quality, line, etc. All these aspects kept me pretty enthralled with my work and the fun of wood/linocut. Unfortunately, I rarely ventured beyond that. I got got so used to “thinking in black and white” that my few efforts to do color were not as successful.

Second, I am ashamed to say, I was pretty lazy. Too lazy to be bothered with the time and effort to design, carve and print multiple plates. Too lazy to futz with trying to get multiple plates to register. Too lazy to try and get the ink colors just right. I know, that’s weird, right? Printmaking is one of the most labor-intensive processes in the practice of art, and I was too lazy to do a few extra plates? If printmaking has taught me anything (and oh the lessons it has indeed taught me) it’s that patients is always rewarded. Perhaps that’s what I love most about printmaking. As much as I twist in the wind over having to take my time, I am indeed forced to stop and consider, and I am always rewarded; either by a fantastic series of prints, or some valuable new information about process. Most of the time it’s both.

But seriously. When you see fantastic works like the ones created by the likes of Tugboat Printshop, how could you not want to venture into the multicolored world of printmaking?

I took the dive into a multiple plate design, simple as it may be, with determination and ambition. My sketchbook is currently full of thumbnails of some designs I want to explore using color. I intended to start small and explore shades of gray with an accent color. It was then I had a bright idea that I would try a few experiments exploring the possibility of creating a “transparent black”, in hopes of laying it over other transparent shades of gray to make more shades of gray. All while still using inks that were 1) non-toxic and water-soluble and 2) could be rolled up and applied via a brayer like normal inks for relief printing.

I can already hear some avid printmakers laughing at the idea of turning black relief ink transparent. It really goes to show you how little I ventured from my comfort zone when it came to branching out from my usual “black ink straight from the tube” practices. For those who don’t know, black ink is dense. It’s pretty much the hardest ink to cut. But, I had pie-eyed dreams that I would be able to have my cake and eat it too. If I were doing moku hanga or chine-collé, it would be a very different story. The long and short of it, after playing with two prominent brands of ink, lots of transparent medium and a handful of other modifiers, I wasn’t able to produce the effects I was hoping for. I settled on making a mostly opaque very light gray for the smoke for this current plate, and will be going back to the drawing board on my other designs (which were to utilize the effects of overlapping grayscale transparencies more than this print.)

In the end, though, I learned a lot as usual and got some great results. I used Akua-Kolor for the smoke, and my usual Caligo Safe-Wash Inks for the black and red colors. They’re still hanging out to dry right now but I hope to edition them this weekend (I’m shooting for 30) and will be available in my Etsy store shortly after!

Good news, everyone! I have a few hand pulled prints up on my Etsy store for purchase. I need to sell off some of my supply so I can get to making even more prints! How exciting! So please, check them out and help me get to make more prints!

Other than that, all quiet on my blog as usual, but hopefully that will change a little. I’m documenting the creation of one of my current prints which I will post when completed. I might also make some regular printmaking posts since I love talking about it so much.

Last year I decided to embark on a small but ambitious gouache resist exercise and make my own custom lotería card designs.

And just what is lotería? In short, it is the “mexican bingo game”. Much like the game we are usually familiar with here in America, the lotería game has similar rules, but with a much more unique delivery system. Like bingo, the game consists of an assortment of playing cards called tablas. But instead of just numbers, there are also images and words making up the spaces in the 4×4 grid. Instead of ping pong balls, the words are selected at random by the caller (or cantor) from a shuffled deck of cards. Another unique aspect to lotería is sometimes riddles or humorous sayings are used instead of saying the word outright.

The quintessential lotería deck contains 54 cards with 54 unique images on them. Because of this, many artists have created their own interpenetration of the traditional lotería deck, as well as created entirely new ones with depictions of their own choosing. In my case, I am the latter, and mixed various expected images in with images of my own choosing. Here are a few I have completed so far:

Links to more information about lotería and other artist’s renditions of the cards:

Marina Pallares’s lotería in linocut
A large collection of commercial and artisan lotería designs
Lotería Cards and Fortune Poems by Artemio Rodriguez
Wikipedia entry on lotería

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In a related vein, keep your eye on Stone Metal Press as they’ve got a couple great lotería themed things going on.

First, if you are local to the San Antonio area, stop by every third Friday for dinner, drink and lotería games for your chance to win some prints! It’s only $25, call director Glenn Faulk (210-416-7043) to reserve your seat!

Second, Stone Metal Press has been and will be busy on completing a completely unique assortment of lot works called Arte de Lotería. It’s a massive undertaking by Stone Metal’s own Jim Kane, where 54 artists have been assigned a lotería card to interpret in their own unique way. The works are then screenprinted as lotería posters. The entire series is set to come out sometime this year, and if you hadn’t noticed already, I have a piece in the series. :)

Bill Fick, a very inspiring contemporary printmaker, gives us a thorough look into how he creates one of his masterpieces from start to finish. Printmaking is all about process, so it’s always inspiring and interesting to view how a piece of art is made.

Video produced by Jim Haverkamp.

My lack of activity in my own website is deplorable, despite much going on that I could easily post about.

Maybe I can get the ball rolling again by talking about a local gem in the art community: Stonemetal Press.

It feels like only yesterday (and yet, ages ago at the same time) that my better half and I moved back to San Antonio. Every atmosphere about this city was completely different than what I was used to, right down to the weather and the public transportation. Needless to say, if you are familiar with the layout of the home of the Alamo, my decision to put off learning to drive had caught up to me when we moved back to south Texas.

The art climate as well, as expected, was different. But certainly not in a bad way. Especially given that it’s home to truly amazing institution; a small but mighty print community called Stonemetal Press. Printmaking has been a big passion of mine since leaving high school, and I often say that if I didn’t go to school for Illustration, I would have gone for Printmaking. Luckily, thanks to this great workshop/gallery nestled in the heart of the Blue Star Art Complex, I can indulge my print-lust on a regular basis. It’s a truly unique and important organization in San Antonio’s creative network.

It’s worth a visit if you’re in town and deserving of your support.

Source.

In the early morning of May 20, a major fire destroyed a large section of our shelter.  We lost our entire cat sheltering area as well as laundry facilities and offices.  We are currently without water, electricity and phone service.

We lost 15 of our beautiful cats that were ready for adoption but all the dogs survived and are being cared for in our kennels and at a veterinary emergency service.

From http://www.berkeleyhumane.org/

This was a heart breaking tragedy I just found out about. During my stay in the Bay Area for schooling, I visited this shelter often. It was very shocking to hear what happened to it. If you are in the area, please contact them to find out how you can help. If you can spare it, please offer a donation. The animals need your help more than ever.

Here's another college sketchbook, the successor to Scenarium, Scenarium Dos. I liked this book mostly because I really had gotten into the habit of just allowing myself to sketch while my day unfolded. Many of these images were made during other students' presentations for lecture classes.

I figure the best way to begin generating content might be to take a look back at stuff I did in the past. Revisiting old ideas, seeing how i worked not but a few short years ago and musing on the processes that took place. I surely doodled and sketched more back then and like any good art student i kept numerous sketchbooks that I filled between boring lectures. I decided to go through a handful of them and scan some of my old favorite pages.

I had a habit of naming each volume and decorating the cover. I guess it gave me a kick start to use it rather than let a pristine book sit in limbo in my bag forever. I found the best way to get a sketchbook going was to fuck it up the first day, pardon my French. I stopped thinking that every page was precious and needed to be a masterpiece and just went for it. It made the creative process less forced. I gleamed most of my sketchbook and doodling habits from one of my idols and professors, Barron Storey, who is the undisputed king of sketchbookery. He was also the one who began my unnatural love affair with the process gouache resist.

No art student is going to argue the importance of the sketchbook, but even after the fact I find these old archives useful and inspiring. Not all my ideas back then were used, and indeed not all the ideas were that good or useful. It's the added benefit of letting them simmer in these pages for a while that gives them time to mature. And then one day when I turn back to that page I can say "Huh! That could be cool!" and an old idea gets reexamined and perhaps the chance to be given new life.

Anyway, that's why I decided to re-post some of the old stuff. Though I can't recall when exactly most of this was drawn, or what on earth I was thinking when I made most of it, it's safe to assume most was done during my time at CCA.

This first book was called Scenarium. This was an earlier sketchbook where I really started to get into brush inking. In fact, though, most brush "ink" in this is actually gouache.

Well, I seem to have done a perfectly terrible job of keeping my primary site abreast of my goings-on. Unfortunately, there's not much to report. I've updated the gallery with some recent works, and gave my website a slight design touch up, but beyond that not much else.

I will say I am working on a few projects and have a couple ideas to make this site more active, particularly this blog. When I'm not making art, I'm usually talking about it. I can't shut up about it! So I want to get into the habit of sharing new discoveries and musings through this site. One of the cardinal rules of commercial art making that I learned in school (in regards to websites) was not to let visitors navigate away to your competition through your site. But honestly, as I've come to learn from my experiences with a web based community, was that creative networks do a lot to strengthen and inspire viewer and artist alike. I've learned a lot just by the grace of other artists letting the public into their world. I want to be that kind of artist. Before I wanted to be an illustrator, I knew well enough what my philosophy in art making was to be: to experience and share, and instill the notion that art as an experience belongs to everyone. So, perhaps that is the direction I will take this blog.

Fwew! Well, we certainly will see. Keep in touch for updates!

Here's some recent gouache resist pieces.