Hello and Welcome Friends,

Although my pace of printing in the last half of the year was very slow, I was able to accomplish much. You may recall that last August saw my prints included in the permanent collection of the Boston Atheneaum. This month I was very pleased to receive news that six of my linocuts are now a part of the Syracuse University Art Galleries collection. This coming January my work will be included in a regional juried exhibition at the Brattleboro Museum and Art Center entitled, NXNE 2018 (Jan 13 - Mar 10).

There's more but I'll share it with you after I show you the print I've just finished.

The coastline of Acadia National Park in Maine, USA.

In May of 2012 we were passing through Acadia National Park on our way to Nova Scotia for the summer. It's a wonderful place. I took my share of photographs and have been mulling them over for about five and a half years now. Finally I settled into a composition and setting I wanted to print this November. I started with this photo (taken in bright sunlight) and then considered it at dusk with the rising moon on the horizon. Here's the photo I began with:

The first pass on the press was, like many of my more recent prints, started with none of the block carved. I used three colors and created the overall tone of the piece. The second pass revealed the moon, the highlights on the rocks and some color variations done with the brayer/roller during the inking of the block. The third pass brought in the trees and shadows.

  "Acadian Moon" impressions 1-3

The pattern on the interior of the moon was a separate color which I applied with a stamp after the second pass.

I carved the block for four days before I was ready to print the last impression. I found it difficult to see what my carving was going to look like but was pretty happy with how it came out in the end. In my description I list it as a 4-color print. But really this means four passes through the press. There are 13 colors used in total in those four passes (and the stamp above). And here's the final print followed with a detail of the rocks.

"Acadian Moon" 4-color linocut print, 11" x 17"

"Acadian Moon" detail

As I've done from time to time, at the end of the process, I printed just a few one color (actually two colors) impressions of the block in its final state. It is interesting to me how very different the print is without all the colors.

"Acadian Coast" linocut print, 11" x 17"

That about ties up my printmaking this time around. I hope you enjoyed it. As I mentioned in the beginning, there's more: A national juried exhibition at the Blue Mountain Gallery in New York City will run from Jan 2-27. My work is the only non-painting artwork in the show and was selected from more than 1000 entries. In October my print, "Stickneybrook" received the first place award in the Grosse Pointe Artists Association 11th Annual Our Rivers, Our Lakes Exhibition.

And, actually, there is more. But I'll not bore you with that. It gives me something to tell you in my next newsletter. I do hope you enjoyed seeing this new print and reading about my other projects. The new prints can be purchased from this website.

Do write. I enjoy hearing from you.

Yours,

William H. Hays