Penland

I have the great opportunity to spend two weeks at Penland School of Crafts in North Carolina studying letterpress with Steve Miller of Red Hydra Press. This oasis of art is a must visit for the artist looking for an intensive two-weeks of learning new skills or honing current skills. I come for the latter.

Nearly half-way into the fortnight I’ve already learned how to make a sandragraph, fine-tune printing on the Vandercook Proof Press and the Scratch neg. If you take my Experimental Letterpress class through MCLA this summer, you’ll learn some of what I learned during these two weeks.

We are also working on reduction linocuts, Steve calls them suicide blocks. I’m making one from a drawing that came from reading Italo Calvino’s Invisible Cities. Really great stuff.

Reduction or suicide block in progress

I’ll post the completed print sometime this weekend.