My life changed today. When I first got my Chandler and Price press (a 1909 treadle), I didn't know much about presses. The printing area was 10x15", but it's clam shell press, which means it gives one good smack, and the pressure diffuses across that whole area. So clam shells never print well across their full area. I tried to do a couple of prints on it, was dissatisfied with the results (prints are also much darker than type, which is a large percentage of white space and therefore easier to print), and gave up. I love this press for its ease of use. I can do 500 note cards and other small items easily, but I mentally wrote off doing actual art prints on it.

I finally realized this summer that I have much more experience with it now and could probably get it to do more of what I would like. It inks the prints itself, instead of me hand inking, placing the paper and block together on a diagram to get them straight, carrying both to the proof press, and sliding it across. I can do a dozen prints that way instead of 500.

So lately I've been testing smaller blocks on the press. I started with a 5x7", which worked great when I proofed it (still haven't printed those but will quite soon), and this is a 6x9". I'm going to try an 8x10" next, which is probably about as big as I can go, but still a huge leap for me to be able to do some of my printing in a much less laborious way. I love the carving and creating the image, but the repetitive printing is the least fun for me. Today I did my first block on the C&P and printed an edition of 50 in a couple of hours (including oiling the press, set up, and clean up). Utterly amazing. My prints may be getting a little smaller from here on out...

Here's the proof of the cafe scene I printed today. When the prints dry, I'll be able to scan in a cleaner image that has a background that's whitish, like the paper. This is based on a watercolor done near Montmartre.

I'm doing a lot of proofing this week, including the two small Paris prints above that I want to print on my treadle Chandler and Price once I get them finished. I did the cafe one in red too, since that's how I've been planning the print. It was time to see how that looked.

I also took time out for a sister project. Erin wanted this for an anniversary present, and I loved Princess Bride too. It was a fun afternoon project, and I ended up with an edition of 14, so 13 are up for grabs, starting at our Dog Days of Summer studio sale next weekend (the 15-16th). Holler if you want one, though. They mail nicely. $60, 14x22".

I finished the three day process to a second proof of the phlox forest today, and I'm largely pleased. There's a little glare on the photo. The black will be black in person. And I have to clean up color in the path a little, but it's about ready to pull some final prints.

I'm finally getting this phlox print to the full proofing stage. I started it before my trip to Paris, and it's taking a while to get it together, especially since I came home with other prints in my brain. Above is the first full, three layer proof. I missed some tree trunks in the green block that I need to carve out for the brown paper to show through. It also falls off a bit over on the left side, but it's moving close to being finished. This is my favorite spot in the forest in springtime, just magical, and I had to try a print of it.

Here's what the two under layers look like. I tried some different colored papers just to see, but I had planned it for brown, and I definitely like the brown best.

I have finally finished my Creation triptych, right up against the deadline of hanging my show at Memphis Theological Seminary yesterday. It feels good to see it up on the wall and hanging together as intended. The titles for the pieces are "Firmament," "Every Living Creature," and "And It was Good."

Unlike the vast majority of Adam and Eve paintings, where they are separated by the tree, already in the process of reaching for the apple, or being expelled from the garden in shame, I wanted to include their embrace as part of good creation, part of the full range of wholeness and celebration that God intended for us. As a church we have tended to shy away from Song of Songs and not talk about the bit of Ruth where she is sent in to the harvest floor to seduce Boaz. There is body positive, celebratory sexual space in the Bible, and I see that as one of the gifts of creation when used in loving ways that don't harm other people.

I appreciate working at a seminary that is willing to have these discussions and hang such art.

The show also includes watercolors and pen and ink drawings I did for chapel bulletins through my year at MTS. Above is the Creation series from back in September that the print triptych is based on, and below is Exodus.

One other body of work I included is my letterpress posters. I acquired a printing press and some type about the same time as I started making liturgical work from the Biblical text. I had always been a pure landscapist before, and I have so enjoyed playing with letters and words and images together. There's also a great power in putting words into print, one reason printing presses are so often attacked during revolutions of various kinds. It's meant a lot to be able to typeset and print phrases that catch my heart and my imagination at various places in my life. This work is different from the liturgical pieces, but I feel they are in conversation with each other artistically, and they come together to celebrate a new phase of my art making.

I've been continuing to work on my creation triptych lately. It's taking me a lot more than six days for sure. I've got the sky piece done (that's first proof above, but it's quite close -- I just took more yellow out of the moon).

I've been printing a lot of blue skies lately.

Below is the final of the animal panel and a later draft of Adam and Eve for the third panel. I'm still edging blue back out of the figures. You never want to cut too much at once, since you can't put it back, and I'm hoping I didn't get too extreme last night. I printed blue today and will do the top layer to find out once that dries. This is definitely the slowest one, because the blue is the middle layer instead of the top one. With the other two panels, the only other layer is a light yellow/brown, so it's less of a crisis what happens in the figures with that. The blue is the top pattern layer. With Adam and Eve, the blue can bleed into the figures, so I'm having to really proof it, check it, carve some more, proof it again. Hopefully this last round will work, because I'm hanging the show at the seminary next week, and this is my centerpiece. I'll also hang the watercolor sketches of creation (five total, the number of Wednesday chapels back in September, not the days of creation...) that inspired this print series. It will be fun to have them shown together.

I'm not posting as much as I like to right now. Between the printmaking and some deadlines and seminary work and switching to a new (to me) computer which wasn't talking to the scanner well, I haven't been either sketching or scanning in what I do nearly as much as I like to. An ongoing crisis in my park, where so much of my painting happens, has also taken a ton of time lately. It's lovely to be able to schedule my own time instead of punch a clock. When something that important surfaces, I can take a lot of time to help. But it's all piled up to make me feel pretty frantic lately and to have less art creation time than I like.

I'm strongly looking forward to a return to Paris in a couple of weeks. It will be marvelous to have three weeks solo just to walk, paint (hopefully the weather will cooperate and I can bring home enough work for a show this fall), and look at art. I do love getting away. I always work intensively when I travel, but it's the best part of the work. The book keeping, matting, schlepping work around, and anything else is eliminated, and I just get to paint. So lovely.

Here's the first proof of a print based on the creation of the animals. I'm working on a triptych, if they look right together, or perhaps just a series of three, for my upcoming show at Memphis Theological Seminary. They're based on a series of watercolors I did for MTS worship back last fall.

The sky needs to be lighter and bluer and more gradated, but I'm overall happy with the carving. I started a second proofing round last night. Below you can see the carving underway and also the bottom block proof, with one main gold color but pink rolled in spots for the pig and cow udder. I've also got an Adam and Eve underway, with a moon and sun drawn out but not yet started.

In the meantime, I'm grateful to Audrey and Larry for a marvelous weekend in their company and for the music they played in my house.