For the fifth time, the Santa Barbara Jewish Federation’s Bronfman Family Jewish Community Center will host the Santa Barbara Printmakers, a nonprofit organization dedicated to printmaking as an art form.
The juried exhibition will take place from 5-8 p.m. Thursday, April 7, 2016, during 1st Thursday at 524 Chapala Street in Santa Barbara.
Printmaking consists of the production of images, usually on paper, by transferring an image or design by contact with a matrix such as a block, plate, stone or screen.
Printmakers from Berkeley, Oakland, Los Angeles and San Diego as well as Santa Barbara, Goleta, Ventura and Ojai submitted prints online with their original interpretation of the theme “Wellspring.”
The juror, Dan Welden, commented “The range of techniques I observed, from careful rendering and subtle gradations of color to spontaneous brushstrokes, drew my attention and deserve high recognition. Striking compositions involving figures, architecture and landscape and enhanced by unusual patterns and textures beautifully link symbolic and lyrical elements. Finally, several outstanding works using photographic images as a starting point bring this viewer to a deep sense of mystery.”
Welden is a well-known master printmaker, painter, educator and author who has created distinctive prints and works on paper for over 50 years. His prints were featured in over 80 international solo exhibitions in museums and galleries and over 700 group exhibitions in the U.S., Europe, China, Japan, Switzerland, Australia, New Zealand and Peru.
His work can be found in public and private collections throughout the country, including the Amity Art Foundation in Darien, Conn.; Baltimore Museum of Art in Baltimore; Portland Museum of Art in Portland, Ore.; and Temple University in Philadelphia.
Welden is also an innovator in alternative, safety-oriented printmaking techniques and the originator of Solarplates, a non-toxic form of etching.
He co-authored, with Pauline Muir, Printmaking in the Sun (Watson Guptill, 2001), the comprehensive manual of Solarplate methods, and produced an instructional film in 2005 with the same title.
As a teacher, Welden inspires students around the world by demonstrating how to use Solarplates to create both intaglio and relief prints without the use of acids or other dangerous chemicals. He ran month-long summer workshops for 10 years at Santa Reparata in Florence, Italy.
The past president of the Society of American Graphic Artists, he has taught printmaking at Stony Brook University, Suffolk Community College, Long Island University Southampton and Central Connecticut State University.
His demonstrations at New York State Art Education Association conferences, the Southern Graphics Council and Mid-America Print Council Conferences empower teachers, students and artists to create original prints using the safer methods of Solarplate etching.
The Santa Barbara Printmakers evolved from the Monotype Guild, founded in Santa Barbara in 1989. The small group of artists, who produced one-of-a-kind, hand-pulled prints, has become a membership organization representing nearly 100 artists from the California Central Coast region.
These artists are dedicated to promoting and creating works of art using a variety of hand and press printing techniques for artistic exploration and expression including etching, monoprints, monotypes, woodblock, linocut, collagraphs, lithography, serigraphy and digital production.
A portion of every sale supports Jewish Federation programs.
For more information, visit sbprintmakers.com or jewishsantabarbara.org.
— Brianna Sapp Tivey is the marketing and communications manager at the Santa Barbara Jewish Federation.