Back to School

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House Bill 60 in Utah allows adults 62 and over to audit any public university/college courses for just $25 a semester. The law was passed in 1977, and as a youngster of 22 working at the University of Utah, I remember hearing about the benefit for seniors and felt very excited to get older. Here we are, 40 years later and I've finally reached the ripe ol' age of 62. I signed up for my first class in Relief Printmaking. 

I am enjoying this class immensely. The professor, Justin Diggle, is a talented printmaker, and all of the students in class are wonderful artists. I'm humbled by their enthusiasm and skills. I didn't realize what I was missing out on by being at home working on my art. The class is teaching me new skills, and challenging me to grow as well. I look forward to more classes in the future. 

Some of the mark making work from the class
My mark making/printing on top.


Fish - experiments in mark making and printing

So far we have worked on mark making, and created a piece based upon a made up album/cd cover of our choice. I decided to create an R&B album cover entitled "recurrances" based upon a name my daughter gave me. She is also my model for the cover.
The beginning drawing of "recurrences"

Final prints of "recurrences" after many test prints and adding more carving.


We will have our critics next week. I feel like it's okay for a beginning project. I like her eyes and lips. I'm not excited about her hair. I can now see that it has a lot of variation in texture, but not in tones. It feels kind of flat to me. Or at least the variations in tones aren't showing up in the photo. I'll have to examine it closely again in class. My daughter says she looks like an alien, and she likes it, except for the hair, which is not curly enough in her opinion. Maybe one day I will redo it and see if I can make it better. Or maybe not. Who knows. No time right now as we have a new project to start in reduction printmaking. I need to decide on an image. I'm drawing on my iPad as well as in my sketchbook. Fingers crossed I come up with something I like.

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