Craa-ack! As relief print artists we don’t talk often about the mistakes, accidents, or failures that lead us to a final composition, color choice, or resolution. Or how those accidents sometimes have nothing to do with aesthetics, rather they were hard lessons about materials, physics, chemistry, patience, and/or common sense. So, I’m going to share my most embarrassing wood engraving mishaps with hopes that we can have a great discussion, learn from others’ mistakes, and swap disaster stories! – Joanne Price

Anyone is welcome to join the conversation (you don’t need to be a WEN member) — bring your disaster stories and your questions — this should be a cracker!

If you missed this exciting event, WATCH THE RECORDING: https://youtu.be/PCPx51ni1E4

Find out what disaster struck this reductive self portrait…

The post Wood Engraving Disasters – Virtual Presentation March 21, 2021 appeared first on Starpointe Studio.

This class is designed for beginners and intermediate students of wood engraving — you’ll learn everything you need to know to cut your own original drawings into end-grain hardwood blocks and print them in a limited edition. Instruction will cover all parts of the process – materials, creating and transferring images, tool sharpening, engraving, setting printer’s type by hand, and proofing. Finish the week with two engravings and a collaborative book — the perfect way to start your own art collection! All levels welcome — some drawing experience helpful, but not required.

Register today!

This class would make a great primer for anyone also interested in going to the Wood Engravers’ Network (WEN) annual conference — celebrating 25 years of this exciting graphic medium at Hamilton Wood Type Museum  July 29–August 3, 2019. The Wells Book Arts Summer Institute boasts an impressive line-up of WEN connections — you’ll be in good company with this Book Arts Dream Team no matter what workshop you take!

The post Wood Engraving Class at Wells Book Arts July 14–20, 2019 appeared first on Starpointe Studio.

Register today!

The post Wood Engraving at John C. Campbell Folk School June 9-15, 2019 appeared first on Starpointe Studio.

“For me, wood engraving’s intimate scale and slow pace provide a welcome respite from our cyber-fast world. The tactile nature and physicality of the relief printmaking process is satisfying. The strokes of my tools reveal the light, with the image slowly emerging from a darkened surface. It is charmingly mysterious and feeds my need for quiet concentration and hands-on creative productivity.” – Joanne Price

Wood Engraving (also known as Xylography) was developed in the late 18th century by Thomas Bewick (1753–1828), an artist and naturalist in Northern England. Bewick made his living doing commercial graphic design work, much like modern day designers do – making ads, business cards and logos combining image and text. Bewick engraved both cooper and wood, but excelled in the latter. From the 1830s – early 1900s, wood engravings dominated illustration in newspapers, magazines, and in books with demand for increased edition sizes. The demands of the Industrial Revolution created a medium that could be as detailed as copper engraving, able to withstand thousands of impressions and could be printed at the same time as the text. This reduced the printing time, labor, and cost of illustrating text.

Once photographic techniques gained a broader foothold in workshops, the creative engraver in commercial realms declined, but the relief medium as an art form truly blossomed in the early 1900s.

Come discover this medium, steeped in its history, utilized in a computer age, with me!

I’ll show you how I cut my original drawings into endgrain wood. I will demonstrate how I ink and print my wood blocks. I’ll also talk about the history, the tools and materials, as well as contemporary resources and examples. 

Price is nationally known for her wood engravings and is president of the Wood Engravers Network, an organization that fosters education and creates a resource for wood engravers. She has led wood engraving workshops throughout the country, has exhibited widely and teaches printmaking at the University of Kentucky.

The post Wood Engraving Demo at Kentucky Artisan Center at Berea August 11 appeared first on Starpointe Studio.

The first course will be at the School of Visual Concepts (SVC) in Seattle Friday June 22, 10am–4pm. In addition to the wood engraving workshop, there will be a bonus visit to the University of Washington’s Special Collections to view and discuss wood engravings from the collection with curator, Sandra Kroupa on Wednesday June 20 at 3pm AND an exhibit of my engravings at SVC! I hope you’ll join me and veteran engraver, Carl Montford (founder of Rain City Engravers and Montford Press) for a summer-themed dark-art fling! Register today – spots will go fast!
Register HERE

The second course will be at the Western New York Book Arts Center (WYNBAC) amidst downtown Buffalo’s vibrant renewal. The workshop will be held , Sunday July 8th, 10am–4:30pm, the day after BookFest (which you also won’t want to miss!). I honestly don’t know the last time wood engraving was taught in Buffalo – after Frank Eckmair‘s (Buffalo State College Professor Emeritus) influence — maybe in 1995? Join me in reinstating a vibrant graphic tradition in the second (only to NYC) most influential “gateway” city! Us Rust Belt cities need a wood engraving mantra — come on Pittsburg, Cleveland, and Rochester residents — I encourage you to participate!

Register HERE

Buffalo City Hall, wood engraving

The post Wood Engraving Classes from Coast-to-Coast! appeared first on Starpointe Studio.

Graver to graver, magnifiers poised; the game is on. During this lively demonstration we had an unprecedented face off between metal and wood engraving with James Ehlers (metal), the only tenured professor in the U.S. to hold the title of “Firearms Engraving Guild of American Master Engraver,” and Joanne Price (wood), President of the Wood Engravers’ Network, an elected member of the Society of Wood Engravers, and owner of Starpointe Studio. John Hancock, visual and performance artist, and professor at University of Mary Hardin-Baylor of Texas, moderated the face off. As we discussed the pros and cons of each technique, the moderator engaged the audience with props and performance to demonstrate close-up views of each process in action. Which technique came out on the top?

We talked about each process’ historic roots, tools, materials, and more – you can see the digital slide show on my tablet, an original print by Thomas Bewick from the late 1800s, information about the Wood Engravers’ Network (WEN) along with some of WEN’s exhibition catalogs (Right), helpful handouts, some tools and different material examples. Contact me if you would like to have pdf versions of the handouts. I even did some hand-printed take-aways as shown in the video below, although, not nearly enough! Special thanks to Becky Blosser for the great photo of me during the sharpening portion of the demo. Thanks also to GRS, McClain’s Printmaking Supplies, Conrad Machine Co., Takach Press, Savoir-Faire, and Renaissance Graphics – vendor donations and support were greatly appreciated!

Photo by Becky Blosser

A ridiculously sized cardboard prop of a burin – did I fool you into thinking it was half real?

The post The Engraver’s Smackdown in Las Vegas! appeared first on Starpointe Studio.

I often participate in printmaking’s great tradition of print exchanges. This image is for one such exchange organized by the Wood Engravers’ Network and Hamilton Wood Type & Printing Museum, called Seize the Carp! This long-term collaboration is in the spirit of carpe diem – seize the day – for wood engravers. This block will soon go to the Hamilton Wood Type Museum for their collection, joining the other 5 or so carp-related engravings. The hope is that they will be used by visitors to create fun and unique posters or other letterpress art to celebrate Carp Fest held in Two Rivers, Wisconsin every year. Once these prints are gone, they are really gone!

In deciding on the composition of this print, I thought of the Carp Fest and decided to include a small boat with an angler, fishing for that winning carp! The water element was great fun to play around with—bubbles, ripples and waves—plus the fish scales.

Come see the block and print at the 2018 Kentucky Crafted Market! I’ll have these for sale as well as my other prints, books and small boxes! The KY Crafted Market is Friday March 2, 5-8 p.m., Saturday March 3, 10 a.m. to 7 p.m., and Sunday March 4, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Please join me – I’d love to see you!

The drawing on the block—a quarter round piece of Maple end grain – the same wood that Hamilton Wood Type & Printing Museum uses to create its wood type.

Making good engraving progress here. The white in the block is powdered calcium carbonate (chalk used in gymnastics and mountain climbing) that helps me see the engraved marks better.

After several proofs and more engraving, I’m finally ready to print these!

The post A Big Carp in a Small Pond – Seize the Carp! appeared first on Starpointe Studio.

Western New York Book Arts Center’s Members’ Show, July 14–August 18, 2017 (Buffalo, NY)

Minnesota Center for Book Arts‘ Parts of a Whole 4. August 25–October 29, 2017 (Minneapolis, MN)

Society of Wood Engravers 80th Annual Exhibition. October 18–November 4, 2017 at The North Wall Gallery, (Oxford, UK)

The post See Starpointe Studio Prints on Exhibit in NJ, NY, MN and Oxford (UK)! appeared first on Starpointe Studio.