Dan Noyes has been with New Grounds for ten years now and brings a sense of peace to the workshop. This serenity shows in his artwork as well. His art is inspired by Japanese prints of the Edo era which focus on the ordinary transient quality of life. He borrows the iconography from that era but combines them with contemporary symbols representing transience such as birds, butterflies, and bubbles.
Dan and former member, Robert Flinkmann
Dan gave a demonstration of how he uses multiple media to create the soft, serene images. He begins the demo using two collagraph plates that he has already made. Collagraphs are made using matboard with found objects glued to the surface. The plate is then coated with Polycrylic to seal it completely. The surface is then wiped with ink. Dan uses a tarlatan (cheese-cloth type material) to push the ink under the surface and to remove any excess ink.
Dan then takes the two collagraph plates shown below and places them on the press bed. He lays a sheet of paper on top of the plates, puts the blankets on top of that and runs it through the press. The image is impressed onto the paper.
For the next layer Dan has a piece of wood panel that he rolls the Akua water-based monotype ink onto.
He then places a sheet of paper on top of the wood panel
And with a baren, a circular flat disc with a handle, he applies pressure to the back of the paper. This pressure allows the ink to be released from the block onto the paper.
Dan’s final step is to take the yellow hand printed paper and cut out a square the same size as the first image he printed. (The purple collagraph print seen above) He then places the yellow square on top of the image. He will probably glue it down later.
final image
Now it is snack time!
Thanks to everyone who came out to see the show!
And to our amazing volunteers and Jeff Simpson who took the photographs!
Ray and Leonora
