Oats

It's fast becoming Summer and the grass is growing faster than I can even think about cutting it.
In the fields are witchgrass, rye, wheat, and many others but the showiest in mid-May are the individual plants or stands or fields of oats (avena sativa).

 I've enjoyed listening to the birds and watching the young immature flowers/seeds swing and dangle in the breeze--akin to watching the flickering of a fire or the lapping of the waves. Rhythmic and predictable; so barely but infinitely variable.

I've been cutting them and bringing them in and I have carafes and jam jars, water glasses and vases full of stems and stalks.
Green dangling jewels like earrings or bangles or dry, spiny, bearded, spring-loaded seed heads or the flags they leave behind--"we're off, we're off" for the wind to rustle.

 Here are a few oat-inspired etagami.
The Japanese reads, "they invented dance"--my way of acknowledging the seeming joyful swaying and and almost synchronous ballet of fields of little green ballerinas.
Above, instead is a drypoint print--the sprig of green, immature oats drawn and then incised with a sharp point onto a flattened, recycled, Tetrapak container, and printed with a small press.

Leporello experiments. Prototype Artist Book-Card-Woodblock-Etagami-Thing.

 
I took a rather disappointing workshop a few weeks ago that was supposed to be (I thought) about constructing simple artist books. We didn't spend the day as I had hoped, but I saw enough in the first few minutes to be able to put into practice what had been my original idea--I wanted to try to make a simple artist book that would be relatively easy to put together, but not appear too crude or "craftsy".
The leporello, a small, unbound booklet is usually made accordian-style and it allows for all kinds of modifications in materials, style and final appearance. 

 

I threw this together as a sort of prototype of a book project that I've been thinking about that will combine moku hanga woodblock printed paper with text or type (think letterpress) as well as hand carved and printed words and images.  I had some proofs of my cypress tree print that I made during a recent demonstration and I cut some 3mm hardboard to a size that would approximate the front and back covers. These were covered with Maroon bookcloth and the carefully folded print was also glued down (PVA) to the front and back covers.
 I drew some text with sumi ink (written with a broom straw dipped in ink) in the manner of my English-language etagami and added my hand-carved chop/stamp.


(My apologies in advance to all my readers that are actual book binders or have skill and expertise in sewing book bindings and hand made artist books...this is a crude thing so please be kind).

It has a nice "object" feel. It's heavy enough and neat enough to look finished.
There is the risk that it has merely become a nice greeting card....(my simple phrase pushes it in that direction)...
But I think if the print is actually interesting enough--using the right paper and an image and handling that is a little spontaneous, the possibilities are intriguing enough to try something a little more important.

Monkeys

Mandrills mean bright, bold, colors.

I am participating again this year in the 2016 Baren Forum's Chinese Zodiac Artist print exchange. 
2016 is a Monkey year, according to the Chinese calendar and I'm busy thinking about what I can do this year that would be something worth spending time to carve, print, send and receive.  Last year I did a black and white wood engraving so this year I'd like to do another moku hanga, color print.

I'm not into the astrology aspect at all and I don't really spend much time with the supposed traits and attributes that each animal year is supposed to bestow on people born in a given animal year......
But I like drawing and printing animals and as a chronic procrastinator, the fact that the Asian New Year is in February.

So, I'm drawing monkeys and apes.....
I have a bunch of conflicting ideas....and my final choice of subject will have to be translated into a number of blocks and colors once I decide if I want simple and subtle----or bold and dramatic.

 

 

Market Price--Setting a price for my art.

Color printing sequence.

"How much does this cost?"
This is one of those subjects that makes artists uncomfortable. "How much should I charge or ask for my work. "
I make a point of not asking people to support my artistic output--I think that would be presumptuous--no one asks me to create what I make but me so it's not fair or just that I "expect" people to support me (and I don't).
However, I'd like to think that I make things that people might want, and assuming willing buyers are interested, I need to be prepared to tell them how much, and why, my works cost what they do.

Ideally, interested buyers would chance upon my work, become enthralled, ask me what it costs, laugh saying, "is that all?!?" and buy it on the spot, with another for a gift.
That doesn't happen often.
In my last local show, I had framed prints that ran from $100.00 for the small animal prints (Beetle/lizard/snake/horse) to just under $500 (for my most expensive--"Maple").  The frames, mats and glass alone cost $45.00-$90 each.  I also had a box of unframed prints--mostly black and white for $20.00 with a few of the color prints at $40.00).  My artist colleagues all remarked that my prices were way too low while the average lay person (non artist) commented instead that they were way too dear (in my guest book at least two people wrote, "Too Expensive!!! with three exclamation points and underlined three times.  They didn't leave a name so I couldn't really explain how much work they are, or how much the wood blocks cost or the paper or the framing.

But I do understand. Salaries here are very low, and the average person might earn less than 1000/Euro/month with professionals often earning 10% of what they'd make in the US. Many people now have lost jobs or have only one wage earner at home, so having money left at the end of the month for essentials is hard for many, and art works remain a luxury that come after many other needed essentials.

Obviously, the art market...people who invest in art or travel specifically to look for and buy art works by contemporary artists-- is made up of a different clientele.  Florence is NOT a location for art buyers (except antiques) so I know that I need to look elsewhere if I'm going to market or have any success in finding homes for my original prints.  But that still begs the question of what is "fair" or "reasonable".
There are two ways to go about it. The market price (what the market will bear) that ignores the work or material costs) and is based on what a reasonable person, who might be disposed to buy artwork as a gift or for themselves, would be willing to pay.
I imagine there is a "price point", a figure where the average person looking at a work might say, "hey, that's great, I really like that" at a number that they'd internally think, "that's a good deal' and buy it without remorse. (There are probably several price points---"fair, but I'll have to think about it", "fair but more than I can spend", "too expensive for what it is" and probably, "are they joking!?"....
These values will vary by location and context. My local craft fair won't move anything that costs more than $25.00 while my work would bring 10X those figures in Santa Fe, NM or San Francisco, where I used to live.
The other way to price is of course from the bottom end--calculating materials and labor and trying to factor in a "fair value" for my labor.....:
For the purposes of transparency and to stimulate the debate I've listed my expenses for my last print below:

"Autumn Treasure",  my 8"x10" 9-block woodblock print based on an etagami watercolor drawing was just finished.  I printed 20 copies (so far).  There are 15 copies with text and 5 without and they are all printed on expensive, handmade Japanese washi.
Costs:
Woodblocks: 5 blocks: 3 Shina and 2 Okoume, (carved on each side): $5.00 each......$25.00
Paper 2.5+ Sheets Shin Hosho $25.00/Sheet yielding 9 pieces each+2 $24x2.5 .........$62.00
Pigment and rice paste, sandpaper and photocopies and scrap paper:  ............................$8.00
Labor*: Carving 2 days/10 hours total @ $10/Hr--------------------------------------------$100.00
Printing*: 3 half days/ 15 hours @ $10/hr......................................................................$150.00
Total: $345.00
Costs per print at 20 copies: $17.25 (assuming a $10.00/hr minimum wage).

If I print an additional 30 copies, the original carving costs get divided by the larger number of copies, and as I can now print faster now that I'm familiar with this set of blocks. So Adding in the additional costs of paper and labor: 3.5 sheets = $87.00 and two work days printing (12 hours)--$207.00=$550 total.
So now the total cost of production $550 can be divided by 50 prints, so:
Cost per print at 50 copies is now just $11.00
Obviously, I'd like to add in a factor to make all of this worthwhile, not to mention pay for rent, utilities, health care, and food.....and one can quibble about skilled labor vs. unskilled labor, etc.
Which brings me back to the original argument.
How much are these worth?
How much would you spend?
How much can I reasonably charge (with the intention of having them priced low enough that they will sell briskly rather than waiting for the occasional buyer willing to pay a higher price)? 
And if the total market--at any price--isn't big enough to justify printing 50 copies, I'd rather not......).
For the record:
My kids both said $20-25.00 was what they'd pay without thinking.
My wife pretty much said, "Why would anyone pay for that when you can just print a photocopy off your image from the internet...."
I (as the artist and culprit of this particular work) would have set them at $100 based on the labor involved (valuing my labor at much more than $10.00/hour) but I doubt I will sell any at that figure--it's a pretty, but simple piece and I'm not sure "worth" that figure to anyone but me.  So I was going to set them lower,  at $50.00 before I decided to open up this discussion to the internet/public.

* I have left out of the discussion the question of numbering/editioning these prints.
Traditionally, Japanese prints were NOT numbered. They would print as many as they hoped to sell, and if they ran out, they would print more. Prices were always lower because they were not "limited".
Buyers today all want "numbered" prints--and if I close the edition (to 20 or 50 copies) the price should be presumably higher to compensate me for the resulting "scarcity". Getting back to the argument at the top, printmaking was always meant to be a democratic medium....making multiples so that everyone could afford to bring art into their homes and lives. I'd like to find a way so that at least some of my output is priced so that it's not out of reach of someone who really likes it?

**This little print, "Autumn treasure/chestnuts" was meant to be targeted towards a market that had a modest budget and less to spend. For the sake of comparison, My "Narcissus" print (a little larger than this one) is selling at $200 and and my little Espresso Genie continues to sell consistently at $110.....

Thoughts?
Opinions?

Chestnuts. Etagami to Woodblock: LAILAC DEMO

I cut the blocks for this woodblock print just in time for my little demo for the LAILAC Japanese festival in Scandicci/Florence this weekend.  I had just one hour for my demo both Saturday and Sunday so there really wasn't much time but I think it went well, although I was talking too fast, forgetting to use the microphone,  and printing too so I didn't get to take any photos during my talk (although I took a bunch of the Etagami section).  I had a good crowd, interested and attentive but lacked a video feed so it was hard for those in back to see what I was doing.

I did manage to do a brief oral explanation of moku hanga and the history of Japanese woodblock and Ukiyo-e, describing the big difference between Western and Japanese woodblock techniques with an emphasis on why I use this method for my own work and then quickly moved to the demo part which is why I was there.

Since a big part of the Japanese festival is the Etagami corner (20 Japanese members of the Etagami society came over and were assisting at the tables showing people how to do etagami), I chose to do one of the Fall postcards I made last year, reworking it as a woodblock print.

I had time just to print the keyblock and text and one-two of the color blocks (I had carved 7) so I ended up with about 10 partially printed pieces of washi.
So now that the fair is over, I retreated to my studio and finished these proofs before the paper could go bad.

The original sumi and watercolor etagami postcard.

Simple version; no text and just one of the background blocks.

Text block added (it also has additional chestnut drawing details).

An additional background color block added.

Here are three of the printed variants. These are all on Shin Hosho (from Woodlike Matsumura in Japan and via Intaglio Printmakers in the UK).
One is without the carved text block (which also had some additional drawing lines)
One is with a faint yellow background/beta ban block.
And one is with a supplementary background green block that added a little more depth and was in keeping with the original watercolor washes.

 The hardest part was the small purple/blue spot on the upright chestnut. It meant a round bokashi on one block with blue, and the careful removal of pigment in the same area on another block and there is quite a bit of variability to how they came out.

I'm pretty happy with this. It's pretty close to the original Sumi and watercolor drawing that was the inspiration and a good printing exercise.  I'm not sure which I like better, the one with or without the text. The former retains better the idea of a watercolor still life while the one with text is still an etagami or "Word Picture".   The text reads, "AUTUMN TREASURE" and is a accurate description about how we feel about finding local chestnuts in the woods.

LAILAC Festival. Demo Dilemma.

The 17th LAILAC Japanese Cultural Association Festival is this weekend and I am going to be demonstrating Japanese woodblock printing again during this year's festival. However, while LAST year I manned a table and carved and printed for almost all of the 3 days of the festival, THIS year I am just doing a brief demo (1 hour), each of the two weekend days so I'm trying to figure out how much I can do in such a short time.
There will be a lot going on, as in addition to Intro to Bonsai, Dogs of the Samurai, Gift wraps, Intro to calligraphy, I will be trying to make sense of Ukiyo-e and moku hanga.  As with last year, I will be competing with TAIKO drumming and Japanese theater and dance.

Since I am not a historian, and didn't fall into moku hanga from the Ukiyo-e direction but from the fine-artist-looking-for-a-portable, non-toxic-medium direction.....so I am hesitant and unqualified to discuss-other than briefly-the history and importance of Ukiyo-e.  But, I an a decent printer and the thing I do love and find fascinating is still the process of Japanese woodblock printing so that's what I'll be doing.

I will be printing from my blocks copies of one of my woodblock prints while discussing the technique and some of the history.
But in just an hour it needs to be fairly simple, big enough to be seen from more than just the first row, eye-catching or crowd-pleasing in subject.

I was planning on printing up copies of my CYPRESS trees print (It is Florence, after all).
I carved it at last year's festival but didn't print it until a few weeks later and it has a nice November/Winter palette.  It has the advantage that the blocks are carved, it's a big print, and I've printed enough that I know the quirks of these blocks well enough to do a decent demo.

But since I am ALSO helping out at the Etagami tables, I have been thinking about trying to make another print from one of my etagami. (The Japanese Etagami Society is again sending almost 25 memebers (most over 70 years old) to teach and help at the Etagami stand.  I also will be meeting my Etagami pen-pal for the first time.
Here is an Etagami I did last year and that I mailed to my pen pal over a year ago.  It was one of the ones I liked enough to want to make an attempt at revisiting as a woodblock print and now seems like the perfect occasion.

I've enlarged it to twice it's original postcard dimensions and have traced the reversed design onto 6 blocks. I'm not sure I can get them carved in time for Saturday's demo, but I'm going to try.
It will be fun to try to reproduce the watercolor blush of the chestnuts and the background and I like the idea of keeping the calligraphic text,
"Autumn Gift". I'll post the progress as we get closer to Saturday and Sunday.

Etaga-ME!

"I look a little like this"

My etagami penpal, Yasuko Izumiya, will be coming to Florence for the 17th LAILAC Japanese Festival next month and although we have been exchanging these sumi ink and watercolor drawings for over two years, we've never met in person. The Japanese Etagami Society has many members and last year's group and the publicity they received in their monthly journal (with photos of the fair, the etagami tables, the paintings they did of Florence) has stirred up much interest and I'm told that this year there is a waiting list of those who wanted to come......Most are in their 70's and 80's, so it's quite a stretch to imagine flying from Japan to Italy, touring the country a bit, spending two full days at the Fair, hosting the Etagami tables and helping young and old alike learn how to make etagami, jet-lag and all.

I will be demonstrating moku hanga prints again this year and I've also volunteered to help out with the etagami section if there's need.
I'm thrilled I get to meet my Etagami-pal after sharing  drawings of flowers, bugs and everyday objects with her for almost 2 years.

As we've never met, and there will be a big crowd, I'm sending her these cards to help her pick me out from the others.

Primroses/Primule-March Etagami.

"Spring primroses say, "Hello, Hello".

A little over a year ago we went to the mountains in the Appenines near Genoa.
It was late spring and very damp and there were wild strawberries in bloom (but no fruit) and lots of low yellow primroses flowering.

I dug up a few of each and potted them when I got home.
It's now a year later and the primroses, despite almost complete neglect, are in full bloom.
They are a pale yellow and almost glow in the dark in the early morning and late evening when everything else is dull gray and brown.
Since they are such a local symbol of early spring and seem to me so cheerful and optimistic.
So I chose my vase of transplanted mountain yellow primroses as the subject for my March etagami.

2014: Looking back

I decided to look back at my output for the last year. Artistically, it was a mixed bag. While I produced a few interesting pieces, my general productivity was very low--I produced just a handful of prints in 2014.
Horse/White Knight, my 9 block year of the horse print.
Steel Metaphor (arrow road sign) For the Sketchbook project exchange.
Right of Way (driving school)-- a larger print.
Cardinal Creeper; my first-ever wood engraving on boxwood.
November Cypresses, a long-format landscape...carved and proofed in 2014 but I still need to print the edition.
 I also continued in my exploration of sizing Japanese papers and printing with the technique of moku hanga on western cotton papers and in preparation for teaching,  I made three new barens with the twisted-cord base trying out different kinds of twine and cord to see what might approximate a functional baren for students.

I also painted about a dozen quick etagami sketches--as part of the Florence/Japan Etagami exchange. My small drawings were sent along with those of the other Italian participants to our respective penpals in Japan.

And I entered the world of Art Education;
I demonstrated at the local Japanese Cultural Fair for 3 days in November 2014 and I taught a three day class teaching moku hanga printing to artists.

I also cleaned out a garage and house; supervised the new roof and painting of our Santa Cruz house and found a wonderful new family to stay in our home while we're in Italy. This took the better part of the Summer--the time I would have spent printing had I been more energetic/efficient with my time.

So goodbye 2014. We're well into 2015 and I'm going to try to get through my backlog of "prints waiting to be made" while jumping into a few exciting new projects that will move me in some new directions. Which way? Follow the arrows.