30 January 2015

Call for Entries: First Impressions II, by 8 February

A final reminder that submissions for First Impressions II close on Sunday 8 February
This national printmaking exhibition will feature at Mairangi Arts Centre from 4-28 March.

First Impressions II is a selected printmaking exhibition 
with the award winner receiving a package of: 
$1000 cash prize (Mairangi Arts Centre
$1000 professional A4 Etching Press from RGM manufacturer in Italy (sponsored by The French Art Shop)
The press comes with blankets, a Zinc plate, a copper plate, and a selection of tools. 
and an exhibition at Art at Wharepuke in Northland. 

The second prize winner a $250 product voucher from Factory Frames,
and People's Choice Award winner $200 product voucher 
from Gordon Harris - the Art & Graphic Store

Download the entry form from: www.mairangiarts.co.nz 

29 January 2015

Wansolwara, 24Jan-21Feb, Pukekohe

 Wansolwara is being exhibited at New Zealand Steel Gallery in Franklin Arts Centre, 
from Saturday 24 January to 21 February.
Wansolwara is also including a round table discussion with curators and artists 
at 11am on Saturday 14 February. This is a free event with refreshments provided.


The exhibition title, Wansolwara comes from the Solomon Islands pijin dialect meaning 'one salt water
and with it notions of one ocean, one people, one place. 
Having spent some time in the Solomon Islands working with print and papermaking projects, 
the imagery used by local artists almost always depicts how the way of life is so dependent on water - 
as a food source, as a mean of transportation and as part of a rich cultural mythology.
Artists from Aotearoa New Zealand, Australia, India, Korea, Samoa and the Solomon Islands 
are represented in this exhibition, including local artist Esther Hansen. 
They offer new interpretations of the theme 'a sense of place' and solid reasoning behind their thinking. 
Collectively Wansolwara is a diverse, wide ranging and challenging print exhibition.

Curated by: Steve Lovett, Cerisse Palalangi and Struan Hamilton
Artists: Mita Gilbert, Sheree Stone, Rosemary Mortimer, Neil Emmerson, Christine Wylie, Antonia O’Mahony,
 Irena Keckes, Damon Kawolsky, Jacqueline Aust, Posi Prasad, Emma McLellan, Hyun Ju Kim,
 Suho Yoo, John McKaig, Deborah Crowe, Nofo Me Fale, Faith McManus, Christopher White,
 Lee Brogan, Gabrielle Belz, Sheyne Tuffery, Luisa Tora, Ruby Oakley, Tom Ludvigson, Elle Anderson,
 Chad Andrews, Val Cuthbert, Mark Graver, Esther Hansen, Marion Wassenaar, Winston Shacklock

28 January 2015

New Pages for 2015: Workshops & Reading List

To start 2015, I added a few extra pages here on www.nzprintmakers.com
that I hope will be helpful, and that you may like to add your suggestions to.

This page will help people find printmaking courses around New Zealand.
If you have an upcoming workshop or class you'd like to list, 
please email me the details, dates, cost, and location.


As a response to requests by printmakers to source current books and articles,
I've begun collecting suggestions for a reading list from several NZ printmaking experts.
If you have any recommendations for this list of printmaking books you own & can't live without,
please email me information to share with others.


24 January 2015

Toni Mosley, 30Jan-17Feb, Auckland

If you're in or around Auckland get along to Railway St Studios in Newmarket
to see Toni Mosley's exhibition 'So you think you've got baggage?'
between 30 January -17 February.
There is an opening function 5:30-8pm on Friday 30 January,
and also a printmaking demonstration 12-2pm on Saturday 31 January.


‘So you think you have baggage’ explores the suitcase symbol to represent 
our psychological, social, and cultural baggage. 
Toni uses strong symbols that create quirky images 
that often give the viewer a candid / comical narration of humanity and situations. 

Toni Mosley works in printmaking, photography, drawing and the places where they intersect, 
and is a finalist in the WSA Painting and Printmaking Awards 2015.

19 January 2015

Mark Graver, 24Jan-21Feb, Wellington

Solander Gallery in Wellington is hosting Mark Graver's exhibition Umbra Sumus.
Mark will also conduct an artist talk at 1pm on Saturday 24 January,
followed by the opening function from 1.30pm to 3.00pm. 

Mark Graver, Salix II, 2014
photopolymer & acrylic resist etching, 30x30cm, edition of 36

Taken from a quote by Horace, ulvis et umbra sumus (we are but dust and shadow), 
Umbra Sumus is an ongoing project begun in 2013. 
This exhibition features a suite of shadow-inspired photopolymer etchings 
and is partly a response to the death of Mark's father in January 2011, 
and to the universality of passing time. 
The use of shadows alludes to the movement of light, the passing of time and ultimately to mortality. 
The shadow source photographs are gathered from different places and countries (NZ, UK and Thailand) 
to emphasise the universal correspondence of shared existence and place.

Mark Graver, Brackendene, 2014
photopolymer & acrylic resist etching, 30x30cm, edition of 36

Mark Graver is an award-winning artist printmaker, specialising in non toxic printmaking techniques. 
Born in St Albans, United Kingdom, he moved to New Zealand in 2003. 
Mark established the Wharepuke Print Studio in Kerikeri in 2005.

All the works from this exhibition are available to be viewed online at solandergallery.co.nz

15 January 2015

EIPW 2015

The Elam International Printmaking Workshop (EIPW 2015) 
will bring together respected printmakers from around the globe to celebrate this unique art form. 
In conjunction with Elam students, staff and the wider arts community, 
they will produce original new works across the full range of printmaking techniques, 
culminating in a major exhibition at the Gus Fisher Gallery. 

Fifteen leading tertiary arts providers will be represented at the workshop. 
EIPW 2015 will be organised as a two-weeks live studio project 
in which visiting artists/academics and Elam staff will work side-by-side in the Elam printmaking studios 
(which include facilities for etching, screen-printing and stone lithography). 

There are a number of events that are open to the public: EIPW 2015 Featured Lectures


Mandy Bonnell
21 January, 1-2pm
at Elam Lecture Theatre, 20 Whittaker Place, Auckland City

Join Mandy Bonnell as she discusses her interest in printmaking, her influences and historical references. 
"I am interested in the book as an art form, which has for me a historical affinity 
with the tradition of the sample or pattern book, in use for hundreds of years. 
Originally produced to contain explorative examples of assorted textile patterns and needlepoint 
often taken from plant life, these books were also used for detailed investigative scientific drawings 
and recordings of nature to document the natural world."

 Conditional Spaces: Bettina van Haaren
22 January, 1-3pm
at Elam Lecture Theatre, 20 Whittaker Place, Auckland City

This lecture by Bettina van Haaren will discuss her own practice 
as Professor of Painting, Drawing and Printmaking at Dortmund. 
“As an artist, I explore subject-object relations in my artwork. 
The work takes its starting points from inner experiential reality 
and from direct sensory perception of the world. 
The subject, the self-image, is figured in terms of my observation of objects in isolation 
or in combination with other objects that surround and determine them."


 Songlines and Graphic Diplomacy: Printmaking stories from across the ditch
Michael Kempson and Joseph Scheer
23 January, 12-2pm
at Elam Lecture Theatre, 20 Whittaker Place, Auckland City

Michael Kempson is an artist, curator and collaborative printer living in Sydney, Australia 
and is currently a Senior Lecturer of Printmaking at University of New South Wales Australia Art & Design. 
Kempson initiates printmaking projects as the Director of Cicada Press, 
an educationally based custom-printing research group at UNSW Art & Design, such as;
Songlines is an Australian Aboriginal idea of interconnected pathways used in singing the story of creation. 
This talk will discuss the linked relationships of a print press from one art school in Australia. 
Cicada Press, a pedagogical experiment involving active student participation, 
facilitates engagement through printmaking with Australian Aboriginal communities; 
oceanic conservation projects in New Zealand; mainstream opportunities for artists with disabilities; 
and international projects and exhibitions in many countries. 

Joseph Scheer is a Professor of Print Media and Co-Director/Founder of the Institute for Electronic Arts 
at the School of Art and Design, Alfred University, New York. 
His lecture will discuss his current body of work "Imaging Biodiversity" 
and the print work that has been produced at The Institute for Electronic Arts 
and how technology has been changing the field of Print Media.
Imaging Biodiversity consisting of prints and video produced over the past decade is collectively called . 
It is about seeing the things that live on our planet in a particular intense way. 
This happens by using extreme resolution, extended focus and enlargements 
through scanning and HD Video that are the critical technical elements of Joseph's working process.


Mark Harris and Michael Barnes
27 January, 12-2pm
at Elam Lecture Theatre, 20 Whittaker Place, Auckland City

Mark Harris lives and works in London. 
As Senior Lecturer at Kingston University he teaches both disciplines of Fine Art and Design. 
Working primarily with collage and print his work is informed by an interest in the journey of printed matter. 
His most recent series a continuous state refers to Utopian architecture, 
depicting imagined social and political building schemes. 

Michael Barnes' recent body of graphic works depicts figures and mechanisms that wander or are stranded within the vacuum that has been created for them by the world they exist in.  They are oblivious to not much other than their immediate surroundings and the menial tasks they are either assigned or have voluntarily adopted to cope with their existence or potentially even advance it for the better.  The work addresses in part, the destructive nature and absurdities that so readily prevail amongst human kind, along with themes of mortality and the psychological questions of existence in general.  The images also deal with concerns of the environment, social decay towards a very inward and isolated path, (while supposedly becoming more “global”), and an overall cynical depiction of the historical evolution of so called civilization and its effects upon the world and its inhabitants. 

Leigh Clarke
28 January 
Leigh Clarke was appointed Senior Lecturer in Academic and Research at the London College of Communication in 2003. In 2012 he was appointed Printmaking Tutor at the Royal Academy Schools.
His initial training as an artist began in printmaking alongside a potential career as a stand up comedian. That early combination of activities created the foundations of his practice today and has influenced the cross-fertilization of satire and reprographics.


Irena Keckes
28 January, 3-4pm
at Elam Lecture Theatre, 20 Whittaker Place, Auckland City
Taking mokuhanga (Japanese woodcut) as a starting point,
this presentation discusses print installations that Irena created
during her PhD candidacy at Elam School of Fine Arts, since 2011. 
She will discuss how her practice of using woodcut evolved towards an 'expanded field of print'. 

Gus Fisher Gallery EIPW 2015 Exhibition Opening
 30 January - 28 February
EIPW 2015 is a two-week live studio project in which visiting artists/academics and Elam staff will work side-by-side in the Elam printmaking studios, and an exhibition of the work made during the Workshop will be exhibited at the Gus Fisher Gallery 

 Mariana Smith
31 January, 3-4pm
at Elam Lecture Theatre, 20 Whittaker Place, Auckland City

Mariana Smith will discuss her own studio practice
and the challenges of re-contextualizing the printmaking discipline within the contemporary art and academy.
The inherent characteristics of the print like imprinting, multiplicity, reproduction, dissemination,
and democratization have attracted artists who would not even consider themselves printmakers.
Her studio practice combines large-scale drawings, prints, miniature paintings on copper, and video projections. 
For EIPW 2015 Mariana will embed prints and their copper matrix in the gallery wall.
Presenting the etching matrix, traditionally invisible in relation to the printed image,
she intends to address the printmaking as sculptural and temporal.