Women – Wonder – Wish
Prospectus from Professor Melanie Yazzie:
The theme is open to each artist’s perspective and imagination. The portfolio asks you to create a grouping of work about the idea of female, girl, young adult, woman. What do you want to share about the power we hold as human beings and the power in our own stories.
Paper size: 22” x 30”
Edition: 22 varied edition or monotype series is wonderful.
Due date: May 12, 2025
1 – 20 invited artists
20 & 22. Exhibition Set A & B.
Statement
My statement for the exchange prints created:
“It is necessary to remember, as we think critically about domination, that we all have the capacity to act in ways that oppress, dominate, wound (whether or not that power is institutionalized). It is necessary to remember that it is first the potential oppressor within that we must resist – the potential victim within that we must rescue – otherwise we cannot hope for an end to domination, for liberation.”
― bell hooks, Talking Back: Thinking Feminist, Thinking Black
When in high school, I was given a scanner. One way in which I used it was to take “photographs” of myself, employing it as a kind of camera. I always kept my eyes closed and stayed very still. But now is a time for movement, change, and evolution. In a society that has long sought to exert power over those outside of the white male patriarchy, now is always the time to speak in the languages we know: and mine is in ink. I used a large format scanner to capture 40-50 “portraits,” which I edited in Adobe Photoshop and then printed out a selected number of them as guides in the monotype from plexiglass printmaking process. I used subtractive techniques with a paper towel wrapped around my fingers or a stick and also reduced with a stick and brush. On some of the prints, I painted directly with Gamsol to activate and disturb the ink I’d rolled onto the plexiglass. I also thinned ink with Gamsol and applied it with a brush to the surface of the plexiglass. I generally worked on 3-6 prints at a time, putting in as many hours in a stretch as life would allow. Each print was created on 30”x22” Magnani Pescia paper. Some prints have only 1-2 layers, while in others I packed in many more layers of first impressions and/or ghosting from the remaining ink on the plexi. I worked on the light table in a dark room, and this low lighting helped my focus and ability to discern subtle value shifts in my printed image guides.
22 one of a kind prints in oil-based monotype printmaking on 30″x22″ magnani pescia paper, white.
