May Etagami

While I may not have made the cover,  my first etagami for the Italian/Japanese Etagami exchange made it into the May 2014 edition of Etagami monthly.

That's my red radicchio on the left. Pg. 4.

This is the cover of the May Etagami news magazine.

I don't think it's due to the incredible beauty or calligraphy of my work, but instead due to the fact as this is the first Etagami exchange organized by that association outside of Japan, and this is Florence, it made interesting news for their readers. There was a multi-page article about Florence, and the exchange. I think there are about 30 Italians participating.

The etagami that I sent to Japan this month was taken from a recent photograph of a grape vine budding out. In the wine-making world, this represents the beginning of the growing cycle and the bud will soon be a long vine studded with grapes.  The accompanying text reads, "Some calendars have different beginnings...".

Some Calendars have different beginnings. 3"x5" sumi and watercolor on Japanese kozo paper.

I also did another, this time in English; and sent it off as a postcard to a gardener and friend in Santa Cruz.

And today I stopped by the LAILAC Japanese cultural center to pick up my just-arrived card from from my etagami/penpal in Japan; It portrays what I think must be a blue clematis--called Tessen in Japanese.

I think I can now add to my Curriculum vitae that my work has been published in
"International Art Journals".......

Maple, withering

Maple Branch, (withering).
16"x 15" moku hanga polychrome woodblock print
Hosokawa Japanese Washi
E.V. 10; 3 AP; a still-uncounted number of variants and rejects/misprints.

It was November when I cut off a small branch of the Japanese Maple growing in my mother-in-law's garden. I brought it inside and hung it up and in the span of a few hours the beautiful, Fall, red-carmine-vermillion leaves had twisted and curled as the water fled from their cells and the dry air hastened what Fall would have inevitably wrought later.
The back-lit seeds glowed with the late afternoon sun and the the two leaf surfaces were different colors; the back of the leaves twisted forward to show me their bellies carmine-red, puckered and veined. The front sides glowed from the sun behind,more orange, with only the veins showing dark. The chlorophyll, the green life-blood of all growing plants was too precious to let fall to the ground and had been drawn back into the stems and branches to await the lengthening days of Spring and provide the engine and fuel for next year's growth.

I had been drawing from life only earlier that day and this was another model, only older and more fragile. The dangling seeds were now earrings and jewels and the five limbs of each leaf wrapped around a body that was no longer alive. I sketched this hanging branch with its Baroque leaves with a rapid hand, in pencil, before the light faded and before the mood changed. As it dried I knew that even a careless breath would shake loose the leaves or separate the seeds from whatever invisible connection still held them to stem.


It took a long time to make this print.
Thanks to all who have looked, commented and offered advice and encouragement.
I'm glad Spring is here already and Summer just ahead.

Printing in earnest: Maples again

Barens are covered. Paper has been cut, sized, aged, dampened, and placed in plastic bags to keep damp and printing has begun.
This is a shot in progress: about midway finished--9 impressions so far (and I think I'll need another 6-7).

Japanese Maple--print in progress and detail

Don't know if I am stubborn or just stupid but I keep hoping to get some finished copies of this print--I'm printing on 5 sheets of Magnani incisioni (using these as proofing sheets to confirm registration/color) and 15 of my home-sized Japanese paper (some with heavy size, some with light).
But I'm feeling optimistic as this is looking pretty good so far.....I still have some color decisions to make (the yellow background will mostly disappear) so there is still ample room to screw it up (color isn't my strength).

I've definitely invested more time and energy (and more paper) in this print than anything I've done so far (mostly due to proofing/registration errors) but I'll tally the eventual final "cost" when and if I finish it. All I know is that the stack of bad copies up to now has been getting taller and taller.

But there is hope. Printing is going well. Registration errors are fewer since I started using a carry sheet to carry the thin Hosokawa paper to my block and set it into the kento--this has been crucial as the damp paper is thin and floppy and has to be reliably placed for multiple impressions. It is tolerating lots of impressions and is picking up pigment and not shedding paper/or sticking. My re-carved background block is printing in-register--(although it too has a seam that is printing...(a thin horizontal line is visible on the yellow ground) but this should disappear when I overprint with the old background block.....

One of the reasons this is taking so long is because I am still making decisions as I go along and there are still some unknowns ahead.
That's why it's still fun.

Temporary maple print work station
Paper delivery system is on the left; upper shelf holds paper to be printed; once printed it is moved to lower shelf. I had to improvise to be able to work with a big sheet of damp paper (paper size is 15" x 16" (41cm x 42cm)).