the cassandra pages

Christmas Love and Light to All

This angel comes to you bearing my best wishes for these last days of 2021, however you observe or celebrate them - may there be love, and music, and some joy and peace in your life, and recognition that you have friends who care about you even if we are all far away from one another.

The sun is shining brightly on the snow outside my window today, as the large flock of little sparrows chirps in the hedge, and the cat does her morning toilette, all of them oblivious to the troubles and worries that beset their human companions. Inhabiting their world for a few moments reminds me I'm a sentient being too with some control over my thoughts -- and all is neither dark nor lost on this Christmas Eve Day, there is a lot of love and hope in my heart, and a lot of love and hope out in the world.

I'm not singing this season, or tonight, but here is a link to the beautiful service of Lessons and Carols that our choir sang last Sunday - I hope it brings an hour of peace and reflection for some of you too. Happy Christmas! And please write a note here and tell me how and what you're doing. All the best to you, with love,

 

On Selling Art Online

After eight years, today I've closed my shop on Etsy.

Selling my artwork there has been a mixed experience. Originally, I liked having an online shop where people could see my linocut prints, small watercolors, and larger pastels -- it was a simple solution that gave me control over my own sales with a commission much smaller than a gallery, and allowed me to offer custom paintings. I rather enjoyed the process of setting up and maintaining the shop itself. I've been delighted when friends or people unknown to me have purchased a print or painting - but some of them would have done that anyway. I have received several large pastel painting commissions that came to me through Etsy, and I appreciate that. But I've decided that, with rare exceptions, I'd rather not work on commission; I think my days of doing commercial design and art to a client's specifications are pretty much over. As I enter a phase of my life where I have more time for my own artwork, I find I am taking the process itself more seriously, and am gradually loosening those professional-designer ties to a lifetime of commissioned work=financial reward. That's not a particularly easy transition for someone like me who has been fairly successful in business, but it's necessary. I want to follow my own heart, and do the work that comes from myself, for itself. If others find that work beautiful, interesting, or desirable, I will be very gratified, but pleasing others has to change from being the primary goal to something extra. The client, in fact, is now myself.

While I've been pondering these issues for a while, the impetus to actually bail out came from a policy change at Etsy: the online craft site has recently required all of its sellers to switch from PayPal-only payments to allowing credit card payments tied to the seller's bank. PayPal is still allowed, but only if this "Direct Payment" method is also enabled. PayPal has been an extremely secure and professional online "bank" that I've used for many years, both for Phoenicia Publishing and my art sales. I don't think the same is true for Etsy, which is reportedly in some trouble. They've recently extended this deadline from May 17 to the end of May, presumably because not enough of their sellers have made the required changes. When I saw this, I became doubly concerned. Why, in today's climate of internet fraud and hacking attacks, should I give bank account information to Etsy? I could open a single account at a different bank, specifically for this purpose, and keep a small balance there, to protect myself - but is it worth the trouble? I decided it wasn't.

But that's not the only reason. Etsy has become a place where, in my opinion, people look for handmade items that cost less than fifty dollars. I do it myself - I've bought handmade jewelry there, some ceramics and clothing, some craft and textile supplies, and it has been a good source for gifts. But I've increasingly felt that while it is good for crafts, particularly on the "cute" side, it isn't appropriate for serious artists. Etsy does function as a search engine for people who are looking for art with, for example, an Icelandic or Vermont theme - and these people may reach my shop. The stats indicate that they do. But while they might buy a set of cards for $10 or $15, if I offered them, few buy a painting or even a print.

It is difficult enough to be paid for art of any kind now; the internet has convinced people that art and music are free. Is the choice, however, to devalue one's work, or to fit oneself to the market? At this point in life, I don't want to do that; it's really that simple. On the other hand, I feel like I need to do more to help educate people about how to buy art, because for so many people it can be intimidating, as well as why it's good value to spend the cost of a couple of restaurant lunches-with-wine for a print you can live with and enjoy for years, or the price of three lattes on a beautiful edition of a book you can hold in your hands.

It's likely that I'll set up a gallery or some other online presence to show my recent work, but as in blogging/website domains vs. social media, I want to be in control of my own online presence and not follow someone else's rules, or be used for their business plan or data harvesting purposes, and I certainly don't want to put myself at financial risk -- we all need to be extremely vigilant about our passwords and exposure online.

But the bottom line is that I will always love it when people want to live with a piece of my art, which is why I sometimes give work away, too -- it is not, primarily, about the money, but about what feels right and good to me, and how I feel about art in general -- and right now it feels like time for a change. Thank you to everyone here who has supported and encouraged my artwork, as well as the books I publish; they're not going away!

The Mexican Printmakers - Part II

Alfredo Zalce, "La revolucion y la libertad de prensa" (Revolution and freedom of the press), 1945.

This was such an impressive print. I was often struck by the complicated nature of the compositions, always in service to the subject, and how the artists played with variations in scale, distance, density, positive and negative space in order to achieve the most impact.

In this detail you can see how vigorous and free the carving is. Even in a minutely-planned image, that vigor gives an energy and immediacy that are palpable. Look at how different each face is, and how the artist has treated the texture of the clothing, hair, hats -- so much variation, so little repetition. Only a master could achieve this, because those aspects, I'm sure, happened directly during the carving, not in the drawing.

 

Ignacio Aguirre, "Las tropas constitutionalistas hacen el primer reparto des tierras" (Constitutionalist troops make the first land distribution),1946.

Another great use of perspective and scale.

Ignacio Aguirre Camacho, "Venustiano Carranza arenga los jefes constitutionalistas" (Venustiano Carranza harangues the constitutionalist chiefs), 1947.

I love the large dark figure of Venusiano contrasted with the multiple figures and flags on the top and right . And the many types of marks used to make the ground interesting, then the composition tied together with the white banner. Such a great use of positive and negative.

Leopoldo Mendez, "Deportacion a la muerte" (Deportation to death), 1942

And finally, another enormously effective print that uses perspective, scale, and light to create maximum impact, drawing attention to the faces of the huddled deportees, but insisting that we also look up the line to the malevolent cloud of black smoke in the distance.

Seeing these images up close felt like taking a master class in printmaking - it was a privilege, and I learned a lot.

The Mexican Printmakers - Part 1

Jose Chavez Morado, Escuela rural (Country School), 1936

Because I make relief prints, I was very happy to see original prints by of some of the Mexican masters of the early 20th century, in a show about the Arte Moderno movement (Modernism) and Mexican Identity at the Chapultepec Castle. In this post I'm just going to share some of my favorite prints, by different artists using different styles.

Some of these images were made to encourage social programs, agriculture, the building of schools.

Alfredo Zalce, Cosecha de maiz (Corn Harvest), 1948

 

Adolfo Mexiac, Ejidos comunales (no date)

Alfredo Zalce, Jurado popular (Popular jury), 1945. Look at the confidence and expressiveness of Zalce's carving - he was amazing.  

Others commemorated particular events or people.

Alfredo Zalce, Portrait of Venustiano Carranza (first president of the republic) (not dated)

But prints by enormously talented artists were also a major means of political commentary, and I must say they feel more direct and effective than a lot of what goes on today.

Alberto Beltran y Elizabeth Catlett, Detengamos la guerra (Stop the war),1951

Finally, this lithograph seemed particularly timely:

Jose Chavez Morado, La Nube de mentiras (The Cloud of Lies), 1940

Getting Started: Portraits of Women at the Museo Nacional de Arte

Unknown Artist, "Portrait of a Woman Wearing a Shawl," 2nd half of 19th C.

In the past year we've made a decision not to run around too much when traveling -- to do one big thing a day, but not get exhausted trying to do several. Just getting around in such a vast city takes both time and effort (our pedometer shows us that we walked and biked an average of 13-14 daily miles, sometimes as much as 20 in a day; we covered 185 miles in two weeks.) The pattern we developed was to make a substantial breakfast -- yogurt, whole grain cereal, fruit, sometimes eggs and bread -- in our apartment, and spend the first few hours of the day on correspondence, writing, working on pictures we'd taken, drawing, consulting maps and internet and making plans for the day. Then we usually took off by bike or metro or foot in the late morning for whatever destination we'd chosen, either packing a lunch or planning to eat a midday meal out, as many Mexicans do, in mid-afternoon. Depending on that, we'd either come back and cook a late dinner (or a light meal) at the apartment, or eat out, usually in the neighborhood where we were staying, and then have some time to read, shower, and relax. At this time of the year, Mexico City, at 7,000 feet, is still very temperate and pleasant - it never got hotter than the mid 70s (22 degrees C), often rained a little around 4 or 5 pm, and was quite cool at night and in the early morning.

One of the main reasons we go to Mexico City - this was our fifth trip - is to be immersed in a culture that has valued art and design throughout its history, from the pre-Colombian right through the present. On our first full day, we decided to go to the Museo Nacional de Arte. We've been before, but there are always special exhibitions -- and we also wanted to revisit their collection of 19th century landscape paintings by Jose Maria Velasco, who really began the Mexican landscape tradition, and whose work shows what the Valley of Mexico was like before the city filled it and pollution obscured the mountains that ring the valley. (There's a post about this from last year, called "The Air We Breathe.")

This time we saw two small special exhibitions that I thought were excellent. The first was a show of portraits of women by self-taught painters - some folkloric, some highly accomplished - including my favorite, the portrait at the top of this post. Here are some others:

Jose Maria Estrada, "Portrait of the girl Manuela Gutierrez," 1836.

 

I don't have the name of the artist: this painting shows the death of the matriarch of a family.

Unknown artist, "Portrait of a Woman Holding Roses."

 

The second exhibition showed small sculptures of women, and included a couple of prints about the work of sculpture itself: as a relief-printmaker, I would be pleased and inspired over the next two weeks to see a number of master-works by Mexican linocut and woodcut artists in various exhibitions.

Mardonio Magnaña, "Baptism," 2nd quarter of 20th C., stone

Hollow Female Figure, Seated (Maternity Figure), 6th-10th C., clay

Romulo Rozo, "The Mestiza," 1936, bronze

 

Gabriel Fernandez Ledesma, "Sculpture and Direct Carving," woodcut, c. 1928.

These strong portraits of women, in paintings and sculpture, stayed with me, especially during "International Women's Day", an observance I find extremely offensive in its encapsulation -- can anyone imagine an "International Men's Day?" However, that day turned out to be very interesting in Mexico City, so stay tuned!

 

Creativity, Christmas, and Politics

In December, I didn't have much time for holiday-related creative projects. I was busy with a commissioned pastel painting of an Icelandic seascape, and the linocut illustrations (still not completed) for Dave Bonta's Ice Mountain: An Elegy. J. and I made a trip to central New York to celebrate my father's 92nd birthday, in mid-December. There was a lot of rehearsing and singing with my choir for two Lessons&Carols services, one at the beginning of Advent and one just before Christmas, and of course the music for advent Sundays and the midnight mass on Christmas Eve, but we didn't do a Messiah this year, and that was, frankly, a relief. I managed to bake a couple of batches of cookies, but for the first year in ages didn't make any fruitcakes, better known here as Christmas cakes, at all. I had hoped to make some other gifts, but alas, it didn't happen.

However, during the week before Christmas I made some linocut cards that I wanted to share with you virtually, since I only made twenty or so. This is the third holiday medallion-like image I've made; I guess it's turning into a series. So...Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays to you, dear Readers and Friends!

But through it all, there have been a few drawings. I did this drawing of some quinces at my niece's house in New Hampshire, over Thanksgiving, then the dried-up pomegranate in pencil after I got home:

Yesterday I finally found a box of colored pencils I had misplaced since our move up here, and did a couple more drawings last night:

I like the illustrative quality of this Santa with the subdued background - he was originally a candy box, made of flocked paper, with a tree tucked in his arm and a head that bobs on a spring. He belonged to my maternal grandmother and always came out at Christmas in her home, and now in mine. But I think the persimmons, below, deserve a much bolder treatment than they've received here. However, it was a good opportunity to find out more about working with the pencils.

Often I do better without little pointy things in my hands, although speed of drawing helps a great deal to avoid fussiness. I like the vigor of the pomegranate above, and the spontaneity of this dashed-off, fountain pen sketch of a desktop in my studio, on a sheet of paper that already had a big scribble across it:

As the year draws to a close (uh, no pun intended) I do feel the urge to draw, both for its absorbing and meditative quality that I always find restorative, and because I see commitment to creativity as a radical and hopeful act. Not only does it affirm some of the best qualities of human beings, it speaks to a future with hope. I need to shore up my own defenses against the difficulties to come, but I also want to be doing positive creative things that say, "yes, this is who I am, always have been, and always will be, and nothing can take that away." I will be doing political activism too, sometimes combined with art or writing I'm sure (the first thing is to knit a pink pussy hat for a friend who's going to the Women's March on Washington the day after the inauguration) but I think it is vitally important that we don't allow our deepest selves to become de-railed by anger or fear.

Expressing emotion through art is one way forward, but I think it is more true to myself to continually point toward the tender beauty of the world and its people and the love I feel for them, hoping to encourage deeper thoughtfulness and embody positive emotions, rather than making dark and angry paintings or prints. I'm not talking about putting my head in the sand, or fiddling while Rome burns - not at all. What I'm trying to say is there is harmony, balance, and simplicity around us and within us, even at the worst time and in the worst places: the fact that these qualities exist is a continual encouragement, and we can always cultivate greater ability to find, nurture, and protect them. But I don't know exactly what direction my work, including publication projects, will take as events unfold, and it is part of what I know I'll be facing and exploring in 2017.

Happy Holidays!

Wishing you all the joy of simple pleasures this holiday season. Now that my own Christmas has come and is almost gone, I'm looking forward to having some time to actually write again here. Please be safe and warm and peaceful, wherever you are.

 

 

Ice Mountain: the back story according to Dave

In January, Phoenicia will be publishing Ice Mountain: An Elegy, a book of short poems by my longtime close friend and collaborator Dave Bonta. The cover linocut illustration and design are by me, and the book will also include five of my original linocut illustrations, inspired by Dave's poems.

Dave has just written a post at Via Negativa , "The Ice Mountain Cometh," about the genesis of the book, and how it morphed into a collaboration that includes me, and will soon extend to the videographer Marc Neyes and perhaps others, and I thought you might find it as interesting as I did. In his post, Dave talks not only about poetry itself, but print vs digital distribution, and his own commitment to poetry being accessible to everyone, not just to read, but to use and build on creatively. But he's also aware of the financial realities of putting books into print, and discusses how we made the decisions about publication and creative access for this project.

And, last but not at all least, he tells the story of the "porcupine tree" on the cover and what has strangely happened to it...

The picture of Dave above was taken by Alison Kent, and he notes that the sweater he's wearing was knit by Rachel Rawlins according to a traditional Icelandic design named after Odin, the Norse god who brought the gift of poetry to humans.

(Ice Mountain: An Elegy is now available for pre-order at a special price, and will ship in late January. 10% of all proceeds will benefit local and regional conservation efforts in central Pennsylvania.)

 

Questions and Answers about Art and Printmaking, Part 2

Note: This is the second of two posts - here's the link to Part I

 

10. What are some of the challenges you have faced and how have you handled them?

Printmaking always carries technical challenges, and I continue to improve my skills and experiment with new materials and techniques. There's no substitute for experience. In all of the arts, we face the challenge of not becoming discouraged, and the risk of "failure," whatever that means to each of us. We need to continually push ourselves in new directions, and not get stuck in repetition. I'm happiest when I am learning new things and pushing myself, so I try to remember that. I'm over 60 now so I've been at this a pretty long time, and hope to be a creative person until my last breath!

 

11. Which age group do you find your work appeals to most?

I have no idea! It seems to be a broad range.

 

12. Apart from selling your art online, do you market your work in galleries?

Not anymore. The art world has changed a lot. I haven't been associated with a gallery for more than twelve years; I started a blog around that time and began selling online and to personal friends instead. It's more work to do it this way, but I don't have to pay commissions, and I don't mind because I've always had a business and like those aspects of the work. Many artists just want to do the creative work and are intimidated or inexperienced with sales, finances, and marketing, or even think it's beneath them. I think that's too bad. If you can do it yourself, there are a lot of advantages.

 

13. What advice do you have for an aspiring printmaker?

On the art side, my primary advice is to draw every day. Keep a sketchbook and just spend some time each day working in it, drawing ordinary objects, people and scenes from your life. It's like a journal to a writer - an indispensable aid to the eye and hand and the best possible practice. Look at a lot of work and try to understand why certain art appeals to you. Study it. Join printmaking groups on Facebook or other social networks - there are some very good ones where members not only share their work but discuss techniques and all other aspects of art and business.

Making prints and improving your technique is of course very important, but it is through drawing and studying good work of others that you'll begin to learn what makes an excellent print. Study composition and design in particular. Printmaking relies on our ability to use positive/negative space. Drawing in ink, with a large brush, or large pieces of charcoal or graphite, can help us learn how to create a dynamic composition with a good balance of positive and negative, but when you get too tight with small pointed drawing tools, it's hard to see that. So work large sometimes, turn the work sideways and upside down, learn to see it abstractly.

Show your work to others and get comfortable with criticism from people whose opinion you respect. You don't have to take it all to heart; the point is to get to where you can listen objectively to constructive criticism and learn from it, but not be discouraged or thrown off-course, because you gradually become more and more clear about your own work and its direction. Each piece you do is part of the learning process; don't look on it as either a failure or a final achievement, but as stepping-stone to the next piece, the next step on your path.

On the practical side, get comfortable with the business of art. You will need computer skills and a good sense of business in order to be successful, and it's best to accept that this is part of the package and learn to do it early in your career. Most of us will have to supplement our art income with teaching, design, or another job entirely. That's fine, but never lose sight of what your real passion is an make time for it, and you'll be a happier person throughout your life.

Work hard, enjoy it, and good luck!

 

Questions and Answers about Art and Printmaking, Part 1

A printmaking student (thank you, Shanell) recently found my work online, and asked if she could interview me for a class assignment about my artwork, career, and practice. I don't get asked these sorts of questions often, and found it was a good exercise for me to have to formulate a careful response. After writing the answers up for her, I asked if she'd mind if I shared the interview with you. She said she'd be honored, so here we go: I'll post them in two installments to keep the individual posts within a manageable length, and add some illustrations.

--

Reclining nude by Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, Die Brucke.

 

1. Are there particular artists whose work you greatly admire and who may have influenced your own work?

I've been influenced by the relief prints of the German Expressionists, especially the artist collective known as Die Brücke.

A woodcut by Frasconi.

Other favorites are Antonio Frasconi and Leonard Baskin. I'm intrigued by the work of contemporary British artists Angie Lewin, Mark Hearld, and Angela Harding.

A whimsical two-color linocut by Mark Hearld

But my main artistic influences in general have been Picasso, Matisse, Gauguin, and Cezanne.

 

2. Which type of art do you enjoy most and why?

I love paintings, drawings, and prints of all kinds and from all periods - I especially like Flemish/Netherlandish Renaissance paintings, the post-impressionists, and abstract expressionism. But I also love contemporary sculpture. Once a year my husband and I go to Mexico City, and our focus is to look at art. Mexico has a particularly strong tradition of design, art, and craft. This past year we saw magnificent pre-Colombian sculpture, and some sculpture done by an artist named Javier Marin in the past decade and was the best I've ever seen. Yet he is virtually unknown outside Mexico. There are some fantastic contemporary printmakers working in Mexico using linocut - you can find them on Instagram.

 

3. Of all the pieces of art you have done, which is your favourite and why?

A large watercolor portrait I painted way back in the 1980s. It's very free and just kind of worked out magically.

 

4. For your relief prints do you work only with lino or do you use other materials?

I only work in lino. I've done woodcuts, but find them very time-consuming.

 

Me, making a print

5. Do you sometimes use a press to make your prints or are all your prints hand printed?

All of my prints are printed by hand on relatively thin Japanese paper; I feel this method gives me the most control. I have a cast-iron book press with a crank on top that I occasionally use but I'm not happy with it for printing; I'm thinking of buying a small relief press in the next year or two in order to print on heavier papers, but think I will always continue to do most of my printing by hand.

 

6. Do you prefer to use water-based or oil-based inks and why?

I use both. Oil-base inks give the sharpest edge and densest color, but I appreciate the easy clean-up and non-toxicity of water-based inks and use them more often.

 

7. How much time do you devote to printmaking as opposed to graphic design, other types of art and writing?

Maybe 1/3 printmaking, 1/3 graphic design, 1/3 art and writing.

 

8. Apart from the internet, where and how do you sell your work?

To friends and other people who have seen my work in person.

 

9. How does printmaking compare with your other art disciplines in terms of income generation?

My sales of prints are relatively small; historically I have made much more money from commercial graphic design. Sometimes I have a painting commission, or sell a painting or pastel.

I also have a publishing company (Phoenicia Publishing) - I am designer and editor of the books - and last year I published a poetry anthology called "Annunciation," with the work of sixteen invited poets, and illustrated it with my own linocuts. That book sold well online and to friends, and I think it was partly because the illustrations and design made it a special book. So that is a commercial application of printmaking. I also sold some individual prints from that project as a result, and gave a print to each of the poets who participated. All of this increases visibility and credibility, with each discipline helping the others.

Click here to go to Part 2