Well, summer heading this way and I have two woodcut weekend upcoming at The Drawing Studio. These classes are for both beginners and folks who wanted to try their hands at woodcuts again. All materials are covered by the cost of the class. The focus will be cutting, tool care, composition, and printing.  We will only be using black ink in these classes, no short cutting by monoprinting with color. On the other hand if you have taken a woodcut weekend before, in the fall I will be offering a four Saturday Reduction woodcut class, two to three colors on a single block. So here is the info for the summer courses and don’t forget you can sign-up online, at The Drawing Studio’s website.

Woodblock Weekend: Relief Printmaking for Beginners and Beyond (main studio)

Taught by Joe Marshall

Friday, 6–9 pm; Saturday and Sunday, 10 am–4 pm

Section A: July 13 – 15

Section B: August 10 – 12

Intrigued by woodblock, but not sure if it’s for you?

A little bit hooked, and itching to try it again? This

workshop is the perfect opportunity to learn and

practice the basic techniques of woodblock and try

your hand (pun intended) at designing, cutting, and

printing a woodblock print without having to buy a

bunch of tools, inks, paper, and the like.

Fee: each section, $165 (Associates $150),

includes all materials

Close-up preview of back the jacket is called “Golden Jade Tiger”

Note the Tiger claw cuffs and the lining.

Ghost Ninja, woodcut on Shina plywood, printed by hand on chinese paper, paper 7″ x 9″. edition of 15, 2011

Here is my submission for La Calaca print exchange.

· Exhibitions:

1 - In Chicago, IL. USA. *Venue and Date TBA.

2 - Atelier International – Art Gallery. Corpus Christi, TX. *Date TBA

3 - Museo Antiguo Convento San Francisco, Granada, Nicaragua. *Date TBA

4 - Lauderhill Arts Center, Lauderhill, FL. USA. *Date TBA

5 - In Buenos Aires, Argentina. *Venue and Date TBA

*Visit http://calacapress.blogspot.com for Exhibitions updates

· A Portfolio of 12 randomly selected prints will be mailed to each participant in July 2012. We will keep 3 Prints from each edition submitted to the exchange: 1 print will remain at La Calaca Press and 2 for traveling exhibitions and promotional purposes.

· All prints submitted will be put in a web gallery and may be reproduced to promote this project. Please visit:

http://calacapressinternationalprintexchange.blogspot.com/

Looking forward to see your prints!!!

Have a great day!

· Mail your prints to:

La Calaca Press/

Carlos Barberena

324 Washington Blvd.

Apt. 3G. Oak Park, IL 60302

USA

Michelangelos Duel Ninjas

Reyna’s HAM-HAM

Oni

Tiger!

Tiger@

Da Knife

Here is the Wolfbat Castle that was the back drop for the whole week. There were a group of local high school students that made masks, cut blocks printed, and helped with the boxcars.

Here is Sean Star Wars with his Boxcar/Hot Dog Stand. He had the hardest fastest crew there, they were done by lunch on Wednesday! Then Sean got them to work cutting blocks and printing the rest of the week. Sean is a great guy and has a great family.

Here is the side of John Hancock’s boxcar, super scary clown snake thing print. He was really helpful and supportive to everyone there.

Bill Fick the master worked on this car.

Danny Martin rockin’ it at Dirty Printmakers o America’s car. This dude owns this shit.

Cannonball Press’s boxcar crushed it. I helped Martin Mazorra and Mike Houston, and had a great time, those two are machines.

Plunder from my week in Nawlins . . .

Close-up of the tiger helm I made . . .

This was the Tribute I left there . . .

There were so many great folks I met and hung out with, and incredible, beautiful, amazing work . . . It was well worth, Printmakers rock, Peace

                                                             Prints Recast

One of the powers of printmaking is the process which allows an image to be repeated. The printmaker has the choice as to the number of times an image is repeated. Traditionally, this is done in a numbered edition series, in which the prints are similar, numbered in the order they were printed and make up a whole set. In this exhibition, I have taken another path. I utilized a variety of techniques for the alterations. In some pieces blocks were printed on different color material with different colored ink. In other pieces I have taken proofs and cut them up to combine the fractured elements with mixed media; adding nuances and components that enhance and recast the previous content and intent of the original print. Two of the works were in collaboration with my wife and artist, Josephine Thomason, I printed an image and she finished it using encaustic paint. This variance from a traditional series and the use of these techniques powerfully transforms each print. As the artist, I have captured and accentuated the still underlying form of the original print, like an echo, a reflection, or a shadow.

Here are some of the pieces up:

Poppin’ Pills #3

Poppin’ Pills #2

Poppin’ Pills #1

Emergence w/ Josephine Thomason

Metal Santo

Waterfall Skirt w/ Josephine Thomason

-Wed. March 14th-     Artist will begin working on their boxcars from 10am till dark.

- Thurs. March 15th- Morning from 10am – 4pm Wolfbat Railway Boxcars continues

Evening 6pm-10pm Carnival of Ink, DPA vs. BOP print show, and Drive by Press fashion show

- Fri. March 15th-       Morning 10am-4pm Finish up boxcars.

Evening 6pm – Juried Student print show, Wolfbat and Woodcut Funhouse BBQ

- Sat.March 17th -      Morning 11am-4pm Print market

Evening 6pm – Opening of the Wolfbat Railway (all boxcars by artists will be complete and on Display, BFT awards, and finishing with a procession of the train through the Marigny/Bywater

Pork Chop Press will have a space in the Saturday Print Market and along with Paper Ghost on Friday’s event. We will also by involved in the Carnival of Ink on Thursday night with DBP. This whole event should be the thing to see at SGC, so check out the links bro.

Ronin, woodcut 4″ x 6″

Lucha (Dark), cintra appox.  8″ x 10″, a reworking of an earlier piece

Lucha (Light), cintra appox.  8″ x 10″, a reworking of an earlier piece

Woodcut (poplar) 9″ x12″ appox, Two color over print from a photo Josephine took,

Josie 10×10, woodcut reduction 3 colors, for APG 10×10 exchange

Great White Tiger of the West, this will be in the 9th annual Janet Turner Print Show

That’s it for now. more to come as I’m a cuttin’.

I also bought and traded some sweet ink. The two works above cut and printed by Joseph Velasquez and Chelsy Broussard, Drive by Press, 200,000+ miles.  Next I sold three prints from the Tohonon Chul, Dia de show.

The Fancy Men, Eustace and Percival 2010 woodcut

It was a great show and thanks to Ben Johnson for doing a solid job. I will be in on an APG show in the summer 2012 on the theme of water. Velociprints was this past weekend and it was a lot of fun meeting and talking to folks. I know I sold at least one print.

Balance, woodcut 2011

This Wed 16th at 7pm at the Fox Theatre will be a screening of the film “With my own Two Wheels”, and film about the World Bicycle Relief program. Thanks to Nathan for all the awesome work he did. i can’t wait until next year’s show. I also put up an older piece at BLK skateshop on Toole Ave. I going to design a deck for them so look out. Here the work that is up now.    “Lament for the Dog” Linoleum cut 2006

That’s  all for now, I’ll show you some work later this month, Peace

Then on Saturday night WPA is hosting a Ghost Town Carnival, with games, prints and T-shirts for sale and live printing by WPA and Drive by Press. I’ll there with “Gato Samedi’s Crossroad Ring Toss”, plus I’ll be printing 10pm to Midnight. Don’t miss this chance to check out so great art and artist at work.  I have to say thanks to Rob, Nick, Zach, Lizette, etc for letting be involved in this whole mess it’s been a lot of fun, they don’t know what a pain in the butt I am. PEACE