11th Annual Roadworks

Yesterday, Molly and I  attended the 11th annual Roadworks. It's a fundrasier for the San Francisco Center for the Book.  SFCB promotes and supports book arts--letterpress printing, book binding and the creation of artists' books.

The Roadworks event is always interesting. Aside from the opportunity to watch a huge and classic Buffalo Springfield steamroller 'press' a 3 foot square blockprint onto paper right in the middle of Rhode Island Street, the event offers a chance to meet printmakers and purchase prints.

Here are a few snaps from the day.

Inking a 3 foot square block

After the print was made, printing assistants hung the prints on nearby fencing. Here is a great Godzilla-destroys-San Francisco print by Eric Rewitzer.

A print by Richard Wagener

A beautifully abstracted piece by Luz Marina Ruiz.

Here are a couple more Godzilla pieces from Eric Rewitzer's booth.

Inside the Center for the Book you can check out the fine collection of operational presses.

This one, a Reliance Midget, used to belong to printer Arlin Philpott, our Fairfaxian neighbor.

There were few more large prints from past events on display inside.

Paul Madonna

Art Hazelwood

Rigel Stuhmiller

Kathy Aoki

Two prints by Daniel Gonzalez

All artworks copyright by respective artists

Larry's Vault: Joseph Clement Coll

One of the finest pen and ink illustrators of the first half of the 20th century, hands-down, was Joseph Clement Coll.  Few people today have much familiarity with using a pen dipped in India ink. The look of a pen and ink drawing is never truly duplicated by any form of contemporary marking pen available today. In his day, Coll was one of the masters of the form.

From the Vault, here's an article on Coll from the December 1950 issue of American Artist.

Postscript

Fortunately, Coll has not been entirely forgotten. 

A few years ago Flesk Publicatons published this collection of Coll's work,

Joseph Clement Coll: The Art of Adventure.

2014 Box Show Recap

Today is the last day of the Annual Box Show at Gallery Route One in Pt. Reyes Station. I went over to get a quick glimpse of the work (with about 150 artists involved I still hadn't taken in the entire show).  The last hours of the show transforms the silent auction into a live auction.  The show is a fundraiser for the gallery and overall a great deal of fun. I posted photos of a few of the artworks back in August.  Here are just a few more of my favorites.

"Temptation" by Donna Mckee

"Short Afternoon" by Inez Storer

"Searching for Water" by Ellen Gray

"Ranine Dreams" by Willem van Thillo

"Dream Residue" by John Lawson

The back side ofthe same piece.

"Germinative Practice" by Dorothy Nissen

"Post Apocalyptic Box Jockey" by Walter Liebscher

See our August 5th post for more on this year's Box Show --Larry

 You can always click on images to make them larger

Larry's Cartoon Vault: Rollin Kirby

Here's a piece on the great Pulitzer Prize winning editorial cartoonist Rollin Kirby. It's from the June 1940 edition of American Artist magazine.

Molly's Turn Take 2

This week's West Marin Citizen has an article written by Eileen Puppo about Larry and how he became who he is today!
I thought I'd post it here for you to read:

I am so pleased by this article!

Molly's Turn Again - Larry's portrait

 This painting is from one of my most favorite photos of Larry, taken many years ago when my daughter's mouse, Violet, was alive and well. She was a sweet mouse and Larry, goofing around one day, set her in his (then dark and long) beard - so of course I had to take a picture. I'll paint a more current version of Larry (with his now short and gray beard) soon but I always liked this photo so much and wanted to do a collaboration with Larry that would show his wacky images. With much cajoling he drew these wonderful wacky guys coming out of his head.

I painted the portrait this past June and we posted it here on our blog, but I never quite felt that it was right.  I finally realized that it needed a true color background, the oatmeal behind Larry's images was too similar to the background I had chosen for his portrait. I am so pleased now with the blue behind his crazy images. 

Larry, drawings from his imagination, and Violet the mouse

If your interested in my Beginning Acrylic Painting Portraits & Animals class taught at Riley Street Art Supply, San Rafael or in my home studio please feel free to contact me --Molly

Larry's Vault: Napkin Drawings Part III

Everyone is probably familiar with the drawing game—exquisite corpses—where each participant only sees the end line of the last artist’s part of a drawing and adds to it. Often the results are startling and occasionally truly ridiculous.  Sometimes surprisingly cohesive.

 Here are a few more napkins (see posts of Aug.15^th ) from decades gone by, this time including a few drawing games.

This exquisite corpse was drawn in North Beach on a Vesuvio's Cafe napkin. 

(This one is signed by me and Kathy Nygren)

(Dalison worked on this one)

(This really looks like it was drawn by one person but I drew the face and feet)

This isn't really an exqisite corpse. Random sketches by David Rippee, Alan Cumings and me.

Postscript:

Just a few more napkin sketches

by Dalison

by Hugo

Hugo again

Dalison again