The lighthouse thing was not a deliberate choice. I often look for a picture that reflects something that feels concordant with the moment I’m in, weather being one of the easiest ones. There are a lot of beautiful snow scenes, of course. I’m not a huge fan of snow as a practical thing, but it looks beautiful. It is winter, but so far we haven’t had a lot of snow.
After a week of mostly black and white prints, I wanted something colorful, so I turned back to William Hays, whom you may remember as a Vermont painter turned printmaker to increase accessibility of his works. This piece is set in winter and has some snow, but it’s not primarily a snow scene, and it is in fact a lighthouse scene though I wasn’t specifically looking for one. The color scheme in this print is somewhat muted compared to many of his others–reminds me a bit of Andy Lovell.
We’ve looked at a print of NYC printmaker Karen Whitman’s once before. Her medium is primarily relief block prints. Today’s print is a vaguely sinister atmospheric linocut with a pleasing texture, evoking a mild sense of creepiness. The creepiness calls to mind both Charles Addams and Edward Gorey. Satisfyingly sinister, you might say.
I have found a number of beautiful instances in which poetry has inspired visual art or vice versa, and these definitely include some of the more profound pieces I love. Today’s is a poem by Margaret Taylor Burroughs, whose prints we’ve looked at a couple of times before. You may remember her as an activist/artist/advocate, a poet as well as practitioner of several visual art media. Of those, printmaking is the one for which she is best known.
One of Burroughs’ most famous ( and in my humble opinion, most profound) poems is titled “What Shall I Tell My Children Who Are Black? (Reflections of an African-American Mother)” published in 1963. Here is the first stanza and a little of the second, just to give you a sense of it. (Full text here.)
“What shall I tell my children who are black Of what it means to be a captive in this dark skin What shall I tell my dear one, fruit of my womb, Of how beautiful they are when everywhere they turn They are faced with abhorrence of everything that is black. Villains are black with black hearts. A black cow gives no milk. A black hen lays no eggs. Bad news comes bordered in black, black is evil And evil is black and devils’ food is black…
What shall I tell my dear ones raised in a white world A place where white has been made to represent All that is good and pure and fine and decent….”
This was apparently published in book form with some of her own prints as illustrations. I have been searching but have not yet been able to find a copy quickly and easily. (The Interlibrary Loan request is pending. Even that is pretty amazing in terms of ease, but I’m spoiled by ebooks and buying on Bookfinder.com).
I found an online article that pairs a couple of Burroughs’ prints with the book/poem. Even though the dates mean these can’t possibly be illustrations in the book, they do connect to the poem, so I will share them here today.
Here’s hoping that 2022 is better for people of color and how people treat each other than has been the case (especially 2016-2021).
Person (Two Worlds) (Linocut, 2002) and Faces of My People (Linocut, 2003)
Not surprisingly, perhaps, the term the Three Sisters has been used to describe a number of very different things. Indigenous people of Northeast North America used this term to refer to the co-cultivation of corn, beans and squash (which support each other’s growth, as well as being nutritionally complementary). Interestingly, there are two sets of rock formations on opposite ends of the world which are each called the Three Sisters. One is in New South Wales, Australia; the other in Nova Scotia, Canada. The Nova Scotia rock formations lend their name to today’s print, though the picture does not itself portray the three “sea stacks” of rock, but rather a fishing shack in the area with a sign reading “3 Sisters”.
Today’s artist is again William Hays, Vermont painter-turned-printmaker producing incredibly detailed color prints using the technique of color reduction relief printing.
A couple of months ago, I shared a pandemic-themed print titled “Isolation” by a contemporary German print artist. I thought it was inspired–a perfect visual representation. The artist doesn’t have a enormous output so far, but a decent number of prints, some of which are to my taste and some of which are decidedly not.
There’s one little print which I like, though the visual is not as striking as many I post. The artist often posts his preliminary sketches along with the prints. The preliminary sketch appeals to me a lot more than the print itself. I ask myself why. The print has quite a lot of solid black, which to me feels almost the same as looking at something in low light, where you can’t appreciate as much of the detail (or color when applicable). Also, the solid black is lacking the detail that I love in these classic black-and-white prints. The preliminary sketch is much lighter overall, partly because shading with pencil is intrinsically not as dark as solid areas of black ink, but also because the pencil shading is much more textured. There are also solid black areas in the print in which the corresponding areas of the sketch are barely shaded, including the windows on the right. The cobblestones are also barely indicated in the sketch, leaving a lot less pencil shading corresponding to areas of black ink in the print.
I think I would rather own and hang the sketch instead of the print, if that were an option.
Shady Road (Linocut compared with prelimary graphite sketch, 2021)
I’ve been at this for ten whole weeks, and haven’t missed a day, which I find somewhat shocking. At what point do I stop counting and just keep going?
A week or so ago, I introduced a new (to this space) artist named Grietje Postma, who is a master of the intricate and complex technique of color reduction relief prints. Exploring the same gallery website a few days later, I discovered another artist who is also an incredible master of this same technique. (I presume that this is not accident–did one of them introduce the other to the gallery? Or does the gallery’s “curator” have a particular interest in this technique?) In the intervening week, I’ve been trying to familiarize myself with this new artist’s body of work, and background.
William Hays discovered painting as a teen, and his passion for art led him to formally study sculpture in Alaska. After graduating, he moved to Vermont, and for the next twenty years devoted himself to painting, mostly in oils. His wife suggested making his works more accessible by trying his hand at printmaking, which he quickly mastered and of which he became a passionate practitioner. Within five years, he had switched almost exclusively to printmaking. He carves his reduction prints in both linoleum and wood.
Hays creates landscapes exclusively. His style, even more than Postma’s, is a close to photorealistic style like Wengenroth’s, but in color. HIs choice of colors in most cases is much closer to reality than Postma’s. He sometimes chooses to use some non-realistic colors to add to the mood of the piece.
In honor of the season which is starting to feel more real and present, I’ve selected a piece called Ice Dawn. This is a striking print which feels like it really reflects the feel of the season. (See what I did there?)
I am trying to learn about the history of African-American art in order to better understand the work of many talented artists of color. There’s a lot I have to learn, but this one point really comes through loud and clear. One of the most important ways of ending the perpetual cycle of inequity is to make sure to represent people of color in every medium, in every realm and sector of society. Art is one powerful tool towards that end. Margaret Burroughs was very focused on that goal, especially with regard to children.
I appreciate Escher’s intellectually interesting impossible art, but for the purposes of this sharing project, I am focused on prints that are appealing more at a visual/visceral than a cognitive level. I last shared his Dewdrop.
Today’s print is entitled Rippled Surface, and it’s not especially complex, just beautiful.
I’ve already established that I tend to enjoy monochrome (esp black and white) prints more than color, in general. I’m also discovering that many of the printmakers I like are from and/or do a lot of scenes of New York City. Having lived in the city myself for 7 years, I really enjoy these. Am I discovering so many of them because NYC has a lively arts scene and therefore lots of printmakers gravitate there? Is it a popular subject because these prints sell well? Many of the NYC prints that have caught my eye are really pretty pictures, but don’t grab me in my gut. It’s hard to articulate, but it feels like I’m getting some sense of artistic depth. I’m not necessarily talking about meaning here–I’m just talking about a different kind of artistic value, which is likely very personal.
Today, I looked at the works of five modern or contemporary NYC print artists, and four of them produced very attractive pieces which pleased my eye but didn’t produce a visceral reaction. Karen Whitman is the fifth. I can’t say her pieces feel profoundly meaningful per se, but they do evoke a much deeper feeling than the other four artists. Whitman is still alive and working, has worked as a circus performer, and creates music as well as visual art. Her medium is relief block prints, both linocuts (as in this piece) and woodcuts. Her works are modestly priced as these things go, and I encourage you to look at more of her work
As with many of the artists, I stumbled across a print created by Margaret Burroughs (1915-2010), and thus started to learn about her life Cliche though it is, she was an incredible example of a Renaissance woman. She was a painter, sculptor, poet, printmaker and perhaps most important community organizer and fierce advocate for African American people. She was born in the rural South, but her family moved to Chicago when she was a child, and she lived there for more of her life. She was a gifted artist, being noticed by teachers in her childhood and being encouraged and nurtured. She continually created, never stopping. In addition to her many paintings, sculptures and prints, she authored more than 10 books, mostly poetry and children’s books, and edited several anthologies. She established a museum of African America History and Art (now the DuSable Museum of African American History) and a community art center (the South Side Community Art Center). She was recognized with many awards later in life.
I wrote in a previous post about representation and how important it is. Many African-American artists have worked hard to provide it, and this was one of Burroughs’ passions. In addition to portraying everyday scenes with dark-skinned people, she created some visual art showing strikingly beautiful images of dark-skinned people in dramatic settings. Today’s print is called Black Venus, and is loosely based on Botticelli’s well-known Birth of Venus (humorously referred to by some as Venus on the Half-Shell). There was an intermediate artwork which is important to note. Thomas Stothard’s Voyage of the Sable Venus (see below), created around 1800, replaces Botticelli’s light-skinned Venus with a black one who is clearly traveling across the water in a seashell vessel. Some have suggested that this represents the voyage of black people from Africa to slavery in America, and using the symbol of Venus is an allusion to the rape of enslaved black women. Looking at Stothard’s print, it’s easy to imagine the figure of Triton or Poseidon gazing at Venus in a lecherous and commanding way, whereas in Burrough’s version that figure appears to be looking at Venus with awe or admiration. Stothard’s Venus looks unsure of herself, whereas Burrough’s version presents a calm beauty with no apparent lack of confidence. It’s not clear if Burroughs was aware of Stothard’s piece..
I applaud Burroughs for wanting to represent dark-skinned people in historical or fictional contexts as well. There are many speculations that Jesus, for example, was dark-skinned for all that European artists always represent him as white. Who knows what color skin the mythic gods of Greece had? I find many of Burrough’s prints pleasing and interesting and will undoubtedly show more of them in the future.
Margaret Taylor Burroughs’ Black Venus
Grainger after Stothard’s Voyage of the Sable Venus from Angola to the West Indies
