I’m a very bad printmaker. I somehow managed to miss all of NYC Print Week; every single event. Probably because I was at TAC all weekend, but it is besides the point. Fortunately, John and Isa can tell me all about it!

Of obvious interest to TAC and our blog readers, was the work of Candace Hicks. Isa came across her work at the Printed Matter Book Art Fair at PS1.

A former “house painter, bounty hunter, and au pair, Candace Hicks has spent most of her life in her home state of Texas…She established a non-profit center for the arts in Athens, The Image Warehouse, in 2003. Trained as a print maker, she works primarily with books, but dabbles in video and installation.” (Booklyn.org)

“Storytelling is key to my artistic practice,” Hicks says. “My work acknowledges the unavoidability of simulation and the impossibility of originality. My choice of the book as a principle medium is due to the phenomenon of the book as authoritative. Books provide an arena in which fiction can be accepted as fact and observations can take on a mythic narrative quality.” (Booklyn.com)

While Candace often works in intaglio, collograph, and woodcut, she has taken on fiber arts as well.

(Booklyn.org)

(North Central College)

Common Threads is a series of ten hand-sewn, hand-embroidered soft books, mimicking the very nostalgic “Composition” books of the typical American childhood. The threads create the composition of the lined pages and margins, as well as the writing which seems to capture everyday occurrences and coincidences in movies and books. As Candace works in many media, this inseparability of the writing from the page shows “books continued relevance as a trans-media hybrid.” (Booklyn.org)

 


(Photos from Booklyn.org)

I can’t seem to find a website for Candace. But I see that she has exhibited quite a bit with The Center for Book Arts, as well as North Central College. I want more!

I look forward to hearing from John about other events he attended. John is our very wonderful Screen Printing and After School instructor. The office is usually filled with his doodles we find around the studio — we are obsessed:

 

 

(Bergdorf Goodman window — Photos courtesy John Welles Bartlett)

Any faves from NYC Print Week?

Can’t wait to see what his Graphic Prints students do! Look for new Winter/Spring courses this week at textileartscenter.com