Printing an ancient reef

Roll em' up

steady....

Hovering takes much concentration

I think it is lined up

grrr...roll!

I get to work in my slippers :)

Lift off

And, the tan color is printed and in the right spot. Yahoo!

A colorful reef in progress

I couldn't resist posting this photo of the Devonian Reef woodcut in progress. Much movement thanks to the shooting ammonites in the background with a smattering of colorful ancient corals.

Carving an ancient sea

A new ancient reef woodcut is coming together! Sometimes the blocks look so pretty as I carve...

I live in Ithaca, NY and was told that the Devonian period was almost called "The Ithacan" instead but Devon, England had more clout at the time and jumped on the naming boat first!

Seahorse Latitudes Finished!

Done with my Seahorse Latitudes woodcut! These Longsnout Seahorses make the Sargasso their home. The Sargasso is a large sea that is bound by 3 strong ocean currents. Unfortunately, the movement of the currents make all of our plastics pile up creating the North Atlantic Subtropical Gyre which is basically a landfill at sea. I wonder if plastic mining will be in our future?

The wonderful critters of the Sargasso depend on us. As more of the ocean is littered with trash, oceanographers wonder when the entire ecosystem will start collapsing, or has it already occurred? How much plastic an a pelican eat before it starves, it's stomach full but unable to digest anything? How much petroleum can pass through the gills of a seahorse before it is poisoned? Do we really need that item in a blister pack from the store? What about the people making the plastics that are thrown immediately away when we bring an item home? What is their fate?

I am reading Moby Duck right now by Donovan Hohn which is about his path of following a container ship that spilled into the ocean that was filled with plastic bath toys, he actually visits a trash gyre (there are multiple places in the ocean where currents converge creating multiple gyre's in the sea), goes to a remote beach in Alaska and sees the debris washed up on shore and visits a factory where plastic "things" for American consumers are made. It is quite a good read, and does make me question the fate of plastic, and of all the animals that make the Sargasso their home or any other watery wilderness. I hope that we don't ever see our ocean kissed goodbye, for then, any land dwelling animals surely could not survive. That is unless we colonize the moon.

Devonian Reef

I am working on a commission about the amazing, ancient Devonian Reef. Here are two thumbnails which include Ammonites, Nautilus, Trilobites, Sponges, Cnidarians, Hydrozoas, Echinoderms and more....I was sent an amazing book on Invertebrate Palaeontology and have been enjoying the research about some phylum's that are extinct and others still surviving the in modern day seas.

Seahorses in Progress

Carve Carve Carve! I am busily carving up this woodcut for a collaboration between Pyramid Atlantic and The Sargasso Sea Alliance. Pyramid Atlantic invited 16 artists to make a piece of art about animals in the Sargasso Sea and they are going to make 28" x 8' scrolls that will feature the special marine life that call the Sargasso home. So far the scrolls are slated to be shown at the Washington Printmakers Gallery and Bermuda. 

Pinniped Predicament

And, it's finished! Newest woodcut about crusty ice and walruses. Walrus use ice as a resting site when out to sea searching for prey and as a safe haven to raise pups, far away from the threat of polar bears and people. If the ice disappears, their safety is in danger. All animals that depend on sea ice find themselves in a bit of a "predicament."

Orange Slices

A splash of color to brighten up a grey day in New York City.

A Pinniped Preview

Just about the print the last color on this walrus clump. The guy in the foreground looks like he is ailing from ocean acidification...or the flu.