ccp markmaking workshop

two awesome pieces by christine aaron, 2 of jane tracy's striking textural pieces, june berman's exciting mixed media paper collaged pieces inspired by maps, ethel renek's unique collage and soy wax discharge/stitched paper piece, a blind stitch exercise (sorry, can't remember who this belongs to!), 3 interesting glue drawings and a beautiful rust print by nancy berman, participants working on their blind stitch exercise.

i recently taught my explorations in markmaking workshop at the center for contemporary printmaking in norwalk, ct. this class was made up of all women and all were working artists, which made it a really fun group to teach. this was another small group, but small groups only mean that you have room to make a bigger mess and a ton of work! and they certainly did....
because this workshop was held in a printmaking center and because i'm all about fibers, all of the techniques i demonstrated could be done on fabric and paper (with the exception of composting, which can only be done on fabric). we started out with rust printing, composting and branding on the first day, with some fun markmaking exercises to get everyone in the spirit. the second day was response drawing day, where we covered many kinds of transfer techniques, exquisite corpse, drawing with horsehair and working with water soluble crayons. by the third day, everyone seemed really comfortable with the techniques and they were beginning to put them together in ways that reflected their personal work, which is most exciting for me to see. the techniques of the day were soy wax resist and discharge with bleach, blind contour drawings, instant indigo and texture drawings on cardboard. the fourth day was most exciting for me because it involved drawing with hand and free motion machine stitching and collage. i love introducing stitching as a drawing tool because it's the last thing that comes to mind when one thinks about drawing. we started out with a blind stitch exercise so as to demonstrate that stitching could be a mark, it doesn't have to be done exactly like the stitch manual diagrams (although it's always good to learn how to do it right first). everyone took to stitching right away and a couple of participantss are interested in buying a sewing machine!! once everyone got the stitching bug, they were combining and stitching the drawings they had started in the first days of the workshop.
the last day of the workshop is bittersweet for me, i'm sad to leave my new friends, but so excited for show and tell. everyone made some great work and some have written to tell me how they're continuing to work with and incorporate these new techniques into their current work. above you can see some of the great work produced during this workshop as well as see some other techniques i taught that i didn't mention in my brief synopsis. the participants in this workshop were jane tracy, nancy berman, ethel renek, june berman, christine aaron.
don't be sad that you missed this awesome workshop because i'll be teaching it at peters valley craft center in layton, nj in a few weeks (august 13-17) and there's still time to sign up!!!