Christmas has come early for this girl. I was gifted a Wood Engraving workshop at SaltGrass Printmakers with Koichi Yamamoto, a printing genius who currently teaches at the University of Tennessee. I first heard of him in 2005 when I was at Utah State and he was the head of the Printmaking Department there. I hadn’t yet dipped my pretty little hands into the inky world of printmaking and when I finally decided to do so, he was gone. I never even spoke with him and only got to know him through his work left on the walls and I always wondered how my art and skills would be if I got to learn from him. So, the guy surprised me early by saying he bought me the two day workshop, which took place last week. I was thrilled and couldn’t wait! I went in for the experience and came out with wide eyes.

The maple woodblocks we carved are type high. They are meant to be printed on proofing presses or on a letterpress. Gasp! I have always wanted to letterpress with woodblocks but I carve on  .25″ plywood and knew I had to work with some backings to make it type high (.918″) but I also worried about how easy wood can warp. But this maple wood was smooth and beautiful. And the wood engraving tool is another story. I currently have 14 wood carving tools of different shapes and sizes. The single engraver I was given can create different widths of cuts solely by just how deep you carve. Although I was most definitely not use to carving on such small blocks such as 2″x3″, I learned a whole new world of carving wood that I would like to explore more with my press. Koichi even suggested, after seeing my show Horny, that I use my scroll saw on the woodblocks to eliminate the negative space if I wanted to carve shapes and objects. Great idea!

If that wasn’t fascinating enough, I was encouraged to look into grad schools. Koichi spoke with me about my show and said I am in the right direction and to keep moving. When I told him it might be awhile before I apply for grad school he even encouraged that and admired the time exploring different printmaking mediums, styles, and messages. He also got me thinking more about applying for artist residencies and told me to keep in touch with what I do. In two days I was connected, inspired and educated in a whole new way.

Tags Grad School Koichi Yamamoto letterpress SaltGrass Printmakers wood engraving