Catalan Vessels

Last October, I  spent almost a month at the Art Print Residence, outside of Barcelona in Catalonia, Spain. 

At that time there was a lot of political activism regarding the secession of Catalonia from the rest of the country.  Catalonian flags hung on every building. There were protests, strikes and at the end battles in the center of Barcelona between the police and the protesters that set a pace of almost of a state of emergency. 

I could not stay indifferent to the general state of upheaval, yet I was there to print my woodcuts, images of  bowls and vessels, domestic elements that have little to do with politics. I realized that although I was in sunny Spain working in a great studio surrounded by a garden, a small piece of paradise, instead of using color that reflected the joi de vivre, I was working on compositions using black ink on black paper.

I was wandering why and then I realized that it was my impression of Spain, through the memory of Federico Garcia Lorca’s last play: The house of Bernarda Alba. 

It has been written at the eve of Spanish Civil war in 1936 and is a metaphor of oppressive government. The widow Bernarda Alba is running a very tight household, adhering to her strict rules without taking in consideration the desires and needs of her daughters, creating tension that culminates in tragedy. 

Printing sessions

I am a printmaker who does not own a press. For years I have created prints using alternative printing methods, until my recent residency at the Constellation Stdios, in Lincoln, NE.
Having a press all to myself 24/7 was like falling in love again to a long lost lover. Now I am totally hooked to printing, the ink preparation, the smell, the paper, the trans I get while I am composing my images. I never use sketchbooks. Before the printing session I gather my carved blocks, my tools, the ink, the paper and I compose the images upon the whim of the day. I love the double excitement of pulling a print that I have put together in an almost automatic unpremeditated way. 

Happy new vessels

Let us toast the new year with colorful wood cuts, vessels printed on Japanese Awagami paper, fruit of my residency in Constellation Studios in Nebraska .

May 2019 be a year full of inner light, warmth, creativity and adventure that nourish the soul. 

Ruth Asawa: Life's Work

Ruth Asawa at the Pulitzer Arts Foundation, photos by N.Exarhu

I saw this very beautiful show at the Pulitzer Arts Foundation. Asawa is a remarkable American artist, I had never heard of. Her experimental sculptures are totally innovative, poetic and etherial. She explores light and shadow, weight and volume, materiality and transparency and the in-between or negative space.

"I am able to take a wire line and go into the air and define the air without stealing it from anyone. A line can enclose and define space while letting the air remain air. You can see right through most of my sculpture...And I like the way the pieces overlap, because they are transparent. Transparency is very exciting to me." 

-Ruth Asawa

Pressing Matters

I am getting ready for a week long residency at Karen Kunc’s Constellation Studios in Nebraska. After a long pause of a couple of years I have not been doing printmaking, I am going to start developing my project under the name “Ikat DNA”. 
I am going to create a hybrid between photography and printmaking, exploring the visual vocabulary of Uzbek Ikat textiles and the faces of Uzbekistan’s future. 
My passion for Ikat textiles brought me to the ancient cities on the Silk Road. Khiva, Bukhara, Samarkand, Tashkent. I have spent three weeks touring the landlocked Central Asian Country, crossing deserts, the steppes, visiting fabulous cities and monuments and taking pictures of children. 

Indictio/ Ινδικτος

On the occasion of the Indictio of September 1, 2018 I am starting a personal art blog under the ospices of Charbonnel . 

First and foremost  I should explain what indictio means. 

Since the Roman times Indictio marked the beginning of the year and the time of harvest, compulsory provisions of food and clothing in preparation of the winter, as well as the collection of taxes, the start of the fiscal year. 
In modern day Greece, Indictio marks the new year, a day that counts the time since the beginning of the creation, approximately 7980 years ago. Also Indictio/ Ινδικτος marks still in the rural Greece the first day of the new, as well as the ecclesiastical year. 

From now on, this will be the place I present and write about  my art. Monoprints, photography and ceramics. 
Stay tuned. 
Nancy Exarhu

Embarking to a new year

First day of 2013, a year I intend to keep this blog afloat and bring to its followers lots of art news and artwork! May the wind blow into our sails!