Composition, Color, and Black-- don't be afraid of Black

Thus the struggle begins with the advice of my printmaking professor.... better yet it's begun and I have spent the past two weeks gazing at the two large prints on my wall, sleeping to and waking up to them, always wondering if I like, or dislike. Overall, I do not like them. In fact, I love them. I have fallen in love with this new idea of going larger, the challenge of thinking in new ways. Of course, it can be difficult. Instead of focusing on a single object, I have to focus on many in order to create a more complex piece of work. This new advice has led me to explore more of the human body, and really pull shapes and essentially play... yes, become a little playful. At least with all this playfulness I get to use more color, and be brave with color.

I look at the few inks I have and think of how many different colors I could just create, and oh what could they do when they are layered over each other? What if they dry then I do another layer? What could this do?? In all my thoughts of the future of my prints, there came another issue... not to be afraid of black. Maybe it's because from a painter stand point, I've been told not to use black... but rather make your own black, and I have. However, it appears it is opposite in printmaking. Use black. Use it a lot. And what did I find when I opened that black can? Magic. Perhaps it's just the make-up of the ink, but adding black to blue, to pink, to something else in general, just adds to the color... it becomes a very powerful thing for me to use black. Once again, it presents a challenge, but in the end, I'm happy to accept. So. This has been a lot of ramblings as I sit here and watch the Daily Show amused but still with printing on my mind. And paintings. I'm still painting. Love painting. But printing is a whole new world that I feel I'm fully exploring for the first time... with a push.... a very big push.

This blogging has made me want to sketch out ideas now. Good. But in the mean time, here's a glimpse of what I've done since the summer began--minimal work done, but still, something to explore: