Seven Questions To - Esther McManus

This month we had the pleasure to chat with Esther McManus, screenprinter and storyteller.

Esther McManus is an illustrator, printmaker and a creator of comics, based in London.
Her prints and drawings have a strong sense of narrative, and her stories are inspired by woodlands, folklore, sorcery and dreamscapes. 
She is also a technician at Print Club London - a screenprinting studio in Dalston, East London.

As The Sickle Moon Rises, screenprint.

Seven Questions To - Marina Terauds

May's artist Marina Terauds talks to us about ex-libris.

I was born in Russia, Siberia, near Lake Baikal.
My first memories: snow, long dark cold winters, snow, stars, snow, frozen milk, snow again, and very hot, short bright summers, huge yellow and orange wildflowers – fields full of them.
Since then I don't like snow.
I love the starry sky, constellations and orange-yellow color.
When I was eight my family returned to Latvia, Baltic Sea, where I studied and spent the main part of my life.
My parents were not connected to art in any ways, but they both liked to draw, and in the mornings I could often find delightful surprises in my pad: drawings that my mom and dad made for me while I was sleeping.
We always had a lot of books at home, and my favorites were books with old engravings and pen and ink illustrations.
I graduated from Latvian Academy Of Arts with a MA in Printmaking and from Latvian State University with a MA in Art Education.
In Latvia I taught art and art history, worked as an animator for a film studio and illustrated about twenty books.
I moved to Michigan in 2000, where I set up a small printmaking studio where I work as a self-employed artist.

Chimera, etching, 2005.

Seven Questions To - Anthony Roberto

This is how Anthony Roberto, our March's artist, describes himself.

I am an artist living and working in Portland, Oregon.
Recently I graduated with my bachelor's in printmaking from Pacific Northwest College Of Art with a strong focus on the intaglio techniques of engraving and aquatint.
My work deals with abstractions of time and history that rule our lives, along with the absurd conditions that people find themselves in.
Other times the act of drawing and physically interacting with the plate create images that satisfy me.
It comes and it goes.
I try not to take serious work too seriously.
When the weather gets warmer and I can no longer be found making prints, it probably means I am in Alaska fishing for salmon on the fishing vessel Shawnee, making a living.

Pursuit - A History, drypoint, liftground and water bite aquatint, 2009.
Dimensions: 15,5 x 22 inch.

Seven Questions To - Santy

With this interview we wish to inaugurate a monthly date with a contemporary printmaking artist.
February is the turn of Santy, an internationally acclaimed street artist who is also heavily involved in the world of print.
We loved hearing his irriverent and smart point of view on the international printmaking situation, with a particular focus on his home country, Italy.

Santy, born in 1979 in Naples and currently living in Milan, has been involved in art since his teen years; he attended art school and then the Academy Of Fine Arts Of Brera and during those years he began his adventure in the world of writing, becoming one of the protagonists of the italian scene of the nineties.
Besides painting, a subject in which he graduated with honours, and street art, the artist has a preference for printmaking, with particular interest for screen printing and woodcut.
His poetics have roots in italian folklore, modernized and revisited from a fairytale-like and grotesque point of view, and highly influenced by mysticism and its impact on everyday's life.

Work for Italian Roots, solo show at ProjectB Gallery in Milan, 2008.

Ferro E Fuoco

Due to the lack of a studio of our own, I have been dabbling in other techniques that do not involve acids.
Ferro E Fuoco is the first woodblock print I am satisfied of, but, even though intaglio and relief printing cannot be compared, I feel much more confident when I am using a drypoint.

Ferro E Fuoco, original woodblock print from a limited edition of 3, 2010.
Hand printed on Hahnemühle 300 gsm paper.
Numbered and signed by the artist.
Dimensions: 30 x 40 cm / 11,81 x 15,74 inch, printed area 25 x 30 cm / 9,84 x 11,81 inch.

Ferro E Fuoco is available in our Etsy shop, PRESSURESCAPES, or you can just contact us if you do not have an Etsy account.

Interview - Printsy

Last month we had a chat with Diane Podolsky from Printsy, the community that represents the printmaking artists of Etsy.
You can read all about it here and we hope that it will offer an interesting insight into our art.
Thank you, Printsy!

The Silence Of Reason

Perched on the thin line of our subconscious, the keeper of our dreams reminds us that the flimsy fabric and the translucent threads of our dreams and memories are the materials that keep us together.
When the night comes, he is the one who lulls our reason to sleep with his haunting melody that tells to cherish our wishes, especially the ones that never came true.

The Silence Of Reason, original drypoint print from a limited edition of 15, 2010.
Hand printed on Hahnemühle 300 gsm paper.
Numbered and signed by the artist.
Dimensions: 20 x 20 cm / 7,87 x 7,87 inch, printed area 10 x 12,5 cm / 3,93 x 4,92 inch.

As usual, you can find the original print in our Etsy shop, PRESSURESCAPES, or you can just contact us if you do not have an Etsy account.

Ex-Libris - Alphonse Inoue

Recently I have stumbled upon the amazing ex-libris of Alphonse Inoue, an enigmatic japanese artist.
Sadly, little is known about him, but his beautiful yet disturbing ex-libris speak for themselves: in Inoue's world ball-jointed dolls and young women alike indulge in slightly unsafe sex practices, death seduces life, pretty girls lose their innocence to mythological creatures and wild animals.
In the background nature stands still, and delicate botanica, motionless bodies of water and silent villages reminiscent of 1500's etchings are the only quiet observers of the lasciviousness happening in front of them.
The choice of using chalcography instead of xylography, the preferred technique for japanese ex-libris, indicates a western influence, and so does his subdued erotism, tastefully explicit and never obscene, so different from the boldness of shunga prints, but the roots of his art lie in japanese culture, as one can notice from the omnipresent dualism, typical of taoist Japan, of death versus life.
Although the web lacks any kind of information about his biography, this site offers a quite extensive gallery of Inoue's works.

Exhibition - Hatching: Crossing The Line

I am proud to be part of Hatching: Crossing The Line, a printmaking exhibition organized by Guerilla Galleries.
The title of the show refers to the term hatching, an artistic technique used to create shading effects by drawing closely spaced parallel lines, especially important in linear media, such as many forms of printmaking.
I am participating with three pieces: The Fate, and an aquatint and a drypoint that I will share with you soon.

The Fate

At some point of my artistic career I found out I loved printmaking.
I started collecting books and, more recently, prints, of my favourite printmaking artists, such as Max Klinger, Alfred Kubin and Odilon Redon, but I never had the chance to experiment with it until last year, when I finally had access to an etching press thanks to my friend and fellow artist and printmaker Santy.
My first prints were aquatints and etchings, but lately I have been enjoying creating drypoints on acrylic and copper plates.

 The Fate, original drypoint print from a limited edition of 15, 2010.
Hand printed on Hahnemühle 300 gsm paper.
Numbered and signed by the artist.
Dimensions: 26 x 34 cm / 10,23 x 13,38 inch, printed area 19 x 24,5 cm / 7,48 x 9,64 inch.

The Fate is my first drypoint.
The allegorical representation of the bells is one of my favourite subjects for my paintings, but this time it is heavily inspired by flemish master etchers, especially Pieter Bruegel and his plates made by Hieronymus Cock.
You can find it in our Etsy shop, PRESSURESCAPES, or you can just contact us if you do not have an Etsy account.