At the Corine Woodman Gallery in the Corvallis Arts Center the November 12 to December 4th exhibit is called
The Woodblock Traditional and Experimental featuring long time artist Jessica Billey and a recent graduate of OSU, Tim Hartsock. At the Lunch Box Conversation, Tuesday, November 12, Jessica and Tim answered Hester Couck and the audiences' questions..
Both exhibitors use wood in their work. For Jessica's the prints is the finished art. Her woodblock is a tool for printing multiple prints. While for Tim the wood becomes the finished piece of art. They talked about their process and how they used their tools.
After my previous blogs on the ways brushes can be allowed to govern in traditional and creative finished painting, I enjoyed seeing how traditional and high tech tools play in the process of two very different artists.
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| Traditional V cutter and two U cutters |
Hester Coucke often pairs artists who have contrasting processes. This month is no exception. Both artists share a studio above the Inkwell Home Store in Corvallis but their process comes from different backgrounds. Jessica has been carving since childhood. Tim is new to wood and fresh out of finishing a degree in art at OSU.
Jessica carves birch plywood to make prints and then enjoys the block on her walls while Tim considers the manipulated wood block his finished work of art. His process starts with pencil drawings that he manipulates with Photo Shop and finally burns the image of his handwork into the wood with Oregon State University fancy expensive laser cutter. The look of the lines he originally The same lines character in the end is.from the machines making the manipulations and less from thought and feelings directly made by his own hand. Tim needs to have an exhibit to want to work. an exhibition goal helps to get permission to use the OSU cutter! For him he does not need to be producing art works to be creative. At present he is living as an artist working to make his home his creation.
Jessica starts with photos of flowers combining them into a collage. Then she photo digitizes her collage to make a transparency to project on large plywood blocks approximately four foot by three foot. The projected image is penned with a black Sharpy on the painted red wood so when she cuts the wood the lines are lightest. Carving is very physically difficult and painful. When coming back to a work that builds day by day, knowing her journey path must be calming and meditative keeping her wanting to go to the studio to work. She needs to take breaks and get physical therapy and message.
Like Tim the goal of having an exhibit in the future is a welcome motive for Jessica.
Jessica uses traditional tools like mine. These knives are cheaper than laser cutters by far.
I did wood block prints in the 60's and 70's. My process was to paint the wood block black and carve it freehand while looking at a model. The detail below is example of one of my prints. The lines made by a V cutter. Repeated lines form a gray shape similar to Jessica's favorite method of creating value contrasts.
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detail of woodcut illustrating mark of the V cutter
mostly cutting in the direction of the grain.
Mostly cut in one hour, my choice was cutting with the grain
because it was faster than other tools and offered little resistance saving time.
I apologize for not having pictures of Jessica's work
but too busy care giving to go to the CAC to
photo Jessica's prints and Tim's wood blocks. |
Old growth wood like I used is not readily available today so plywood is the wood of choice. The uneven grain on the wood skins gives Jessica the challenge of adjusting her cuts according to the resistances of working the knives through uneven grains. These irregularities in the wood start a process of give and take between her and the wood. The story of her process is visible in the prints taken from the block. Jessica's woodblock prints tell an intimate story. Tim's are to me an expression of the pulse of today's technology's forced power in contrast to the organic growth of the wood.
