Artist Statements
Henrieke I. Strecker
Remaining at a place, emerging from the usual all-day mad rush, which has no chance, no hope of arrival, permits a perception to come up - what actually happened will appear again. Tales will step out of this rush, gestures threatened to be drowned by this quickness, almost covered by it.
I want to give an account of these small movements, atmospheres, not an isolated moment, "painting a realistic picture", according to a report, but the experience of the situation, which the taking had undergone.
My desire is, that the observer gets in touch with the images, that he tries to follow their history - and by chance a new, very personal one arises, realizing, how these gestures show through; and I want to avoid, that the tale is no longer available, because it is buried by filing in drawers and categorizing. Just have - and trust - your own look, and immerse in this dialogue.
About the process:
The more I deepen into my work, which means to deepen into myself, the more I deepen into the unknown. To be honest, I am not sure if the so-called unknown really does exist. To deepen into the process of my work seems like traveling on a white map. Every step is a new mark on that map, like drawing on a blank sheet of paper, and line by line it will make the drawing.
Most of my images have no titles. I want the observers to get in touch with the images so that they will find their own story. I would never name a breath. My wish is that my images are still breathing even though the processes of exposure and developing are done.
Bror Hultgren
My work is small in scale, primarily black and white, limited to the exploration of line and shape. Many of the works are on my own handmade paper, often distressed in the paper making process. These and other random events and accidents become an integral part of the final piece. Unconsciously the works seem to convey some internal improvisational music onto the two dimensional surface. There seems to be an essential lyricism that grows out of the assorted lines, scratches, stamps and smudges in these works, each mark engaging in a conversation with the other elements of the piece. I find symbols and marks that form the language and calligraphy arise out of experience and intuition. The process of converting them to marks fundamentally alters them to form their own language, whose meaning seems to arise when I apply them to paper.
Trained in mathematics and physics, I am drawn to the abstraction of music found in small chamber music. I find that a single cello line as written by Phillip Glass is as much an abstract and minimal description of an aural landscape as a description of multidimensional logic by linear algebra. These pieces are themselves a similar mapping of my internal aural landscape.
Melody Knight Leary
I have always been intrigued by the unique opportunities that the transferred image affords. Printmaking’s flexibility allows me to explore materials and techniques and combine processes to realize my creative vision. There’s a certain “permission to labor” that is implied in printmaking and as I engage in a private discourse with my work, through its countless transformations, I attempt to evoke for myself some unexpected vision. As a printmaker, this exchange is made visible as working proofs are successively pulled from the plate. The results enable me to see, simultaneously, the original grasping of an idea and subsequent exploration, including the discarding or reworking of images.
My work reflects a curiosity about how we see and how we translate our verbal language into visual expression and reflects an interest in using common objects and natural forms as metaphors to express ideas and emotions. Not always a purist, I exploit any available tool or process to realize my goals. I enjoy complexity, implied meaning and layering. I welcome the challenge of interpreting an image or an idea into a print; building the process in my mind, working within the constraints of the medium, exploring ways to expand beyond them, and realizing the final outcome on paper. As I work from different plates and surfaces, my goal is to keep alive spontaneity and the original intuitive impulse as I search for elegant solutions to creative challenges. At times, the unexpected results speak of dimensions beyond my original intent and lead to revelations about feelings and ideas. The essence of art making, for me, is that each time a viewer is engaged by a work, the creative process is regenerated through the language of the work itself.
I live and work in southeastern Connecticut. Recently retired, after teaching art for many years, I am now concentrating my energies on my own artwork and building my studio practice. My workspace, Treetop Studio, is equipped with a large Rembrandt Elephant Press and provides me with the freedom to seek my creative muse. I work in a variety of techniques and for the past fifteen years have been focusing on less toxic printmaking processes such as photopolymer plates and film, polyester plate lithography and combining these with collagraphs, relief prints, and monotypes. It’s the process and the often unexpected results that captivate me. The smell of the inks, the energy involved in working the plate, the feel of the paper, the magic of the press, all play a roll in printmaking’s allure. The opportunities are unlimited and at the end of a printing session, it is always magical to find out what lies beneath the blankets.
