Tuesday was the last day of my printmaking/silk screening class. While saddened by the end, I am grateful to have been apart of this non-forced learning environment where adults passionate about developing their artistic voice shared their experiences and backgrounds while maintaining their eagerness to learn.
I need to learn how to draw. That is the bottom line. I came to this conclusion in class yesterday when I was trying to trace a photograph of my sister onto a woodblock. This is my second attempt at printmaking on a woodblock. Prior to this class, I could have cared less about printmaking or drawing. All I wanted was to make my t-shirts. However, I see myself, as a result of this class, wanting to pursue printmaking and its various techniques. This is something I hadn’t planned for.
While Poetisa’s Palette has inspired my silk screening venture, capoeira (kä-pə-wā-rə) inspired Poetisa. For those who don’t know, capoeira is a Brazilian/African martial art with various styles and aspects. It is played as a game where the players exchange kicks and escapes inside the roda (circle) to trip the other player up. The game requires a lot of trickery and expression.
Like any journey, the road to creating the ideal silk screen print has tourist attractions, souvenirs, detours, and wrong turns. Sometimes you get loss and need directions; sometimes you just want to try a new route. Sometimes you just want to take your time and enjoy the ride. Each time you make the journey, it gets easier. However there are long roads to travel and various ways to get to your destination. And each time I make the trip, I find myself wanting to go further.
Everything I learned in Elke’s class, I was pretty successful at accomplishing on my own during studio hours. Well, I had few blunders, but I got the hang of things by the second or third try. However, I decided to take a walk on the wild side and try my own project. Now, last week’s class project was printmaking which is a beautiful ancient art form and a complicated skill to master. It involves drawing images onto wood, linoleum or rubber, carving them out, and applying oil based ink to make a print. Unfortunately, this was not how I chose to spend my open studio time. Nope, Thursday afternoon I went rogue and found myself knee deep in brown paper bags.
Sometimes when you find yourself roaming through unfamiliar territories, you have to ask yourself, “How did I get here?” As I sat in studio 3 of the Hyde Park Art Center pulling giant staples out of an old wooden silk screen frame with a flat head screw driver and a pair of needle nosed pliers, I asked myself that very question. How did I get here? And the only reply I could offer myself was the Art of Poetic Skin.
