Metamorphosing Amberwings and Background

Eastern Amberwings II. Moku Hanga by Ken Januski, copyright  2020. 8x10 inches.

I've just finished the second of two Moku Hanga based on Eastern Amberwing dragonflies. Above is the second version. I got the idea for  it as I was printing the background blue for a second time  on the first version(below) and accidentally printed  it upside down. I'd done  the same thing on my recent Golden-crowned  Kinglets Moku Hanga and both times was intrigued by how it changed the  print.

This time I decided to finish the first print without the upside down overprinting. But when I'd finished  the edition I kept  wanting to explore the overprinting and see where  it would lead.

Eastern Amberwings I. Moku Hanga by Ken Januski, copyright  2020. 8x10 inches.

One of the odder things about both prints is that the first print is printed on much better paper than the second. And yet the  first print looks sloppier, especially in the background. So at the moment I much prefer the second more abstract print. But it's possible another printing of the first  would  make it look stronger.

Something I continue to realize  about my work -- it almost catches me by surprise -- is  that I really don't like traditional space in my own work. Perhaps this is  just a matter of the influences of  the time when I first started making art. Much twentieth century art rebelled against a confined flat space in painting, particularly an illusionistic one. Instead either complete  two dimensional  flatness with no hint of depth was admired or more of a pulsating space, as for  instance in Piet Mondrian or Stuart Davis where  various parts of the canvas/picture, no matter how abstract, seemed to intermittently call out for attention. Similar  to the latter I think  was the popularity of collage where fragments of different pictures or representations were pasted together to create something new.

Though I did go through an abstract period  of wanting absolute flatness  and no hint of space I've always been more attracted to the broken, often pulsating space of collage or painters like Stuart Davis. Perhaps if  I'd never left the small town I grew up in and had spent less time in large cities my perspective  would be different. Certainly large cities do have a more pulsating environment with something new always catching your attention.

And yet when I look, very briefly, at video  games or even commercials during  some televised sporting events their wild  cacophony and chaos make the pulsating space of Mondrian and  Davis  look positively bucolic. That type of  non-stop activity seems to me to lead to mental chaos. No wonder so many people  have short attention spans.

But I digress!!!!! I really went through all of  that to explain why I have what may seem to some to be a perverse desire to ruin a good picture. Again this reminds me of  painters  who made sure that their paintings, even when realistic, showed signs of  process, most noticeably in paint drips.  And of course paint drips eventually became one of  the biggest  cliches in modern art.  It's hard  to say how much  coming  of  age when showing process was de rigeur  in art has influenced my own ideas of  what art should  be. But I'm sure I still have a bias for signs of process and for collage.

All I can say is that there is an intuitive desire to  prevent my own work from having a space that seems too confined, too settled. So I often do things to prevent that. I do it  because  is seems  right to me. It gives the picture the ability to breathe, not to be claustrophobic.

So when I mistakenly printed  the background upside down in my last too prints  I was very happy  with the result. It seemed to open up the space in both, to give the prints some room to breathe. But that in itself doesn't make a good painting or  print. It can just look completely out of place. So  for me the challenge of the second Eastern Amberwings print was to develop  the broken background with the  rest of the print so that it all looked cohesive, like it belonged  together. That is what I think I've done.

I have great admiration for  many artists who work with traditional space. But for  me I always get a bit antsy when I see it in my own work. There is a desire to try for something else.

Pick Your Poison: Reduction Cuts versus Moku Hanga

Proof of Eastern Amberwing Moku Hanga. Copyright 2020 by Ken Januski.

Multi-block woodcut of Blackpoll Warblers among Swamp Dogwood,  Copyright 2014 by Ken Januski.

This will be a very short post. I decided to write it after I took a look at my Etsy shop's stats for  last year and saw that the Blackpoll Warblers among Swamp Dogwood was by far the most viewed work  for 2019. But no sales.

It reminded  me of just how difficult it is to make any sense out of  web stats. It also reminded me of Robert Gillmor saying in 'Cutting Away' that he could never tell which prints would be popular. That is my experience. The ones that I think will be popular, largely often because I think that they are just plain good, often are not. Throwaways, in the sense that I did them relatively  quickly, are more popular than I would  have guessed. So as usual I just do what I like  and assume that my work will eventually find an  audience.

But the reduction part of the Blackpoll Warblers also  reminded me of  the blood, sweat and tears, and at one time volatile fumes as well, that accompany them. Though there was always something thrilling about doing them I eventually gave it up. I didn't find the mental wear and tear, coupled with piles and piles of print that had to be rejected as I made more changes, were worth  it. Surely there must be a better way.

For me that is moku hanga, as seen in a recent proof of an Eastern Amberwing.  There is still a fair amount to  do  and  I need to switch to at least one and perhaps two better papers for  the edition.

Why you might ask do I so prefer one over  the other? Well I'm sure that there are different answers for different people and I should also add that I don't really do traditional moku hanga. But I think the most telling  word is  this: organic. Everything about moku hanga seems organic: the materials used, the method of printing,  the many slow, at least for me, processes that make up moku  hanga.

In both reduction prints and in moku hanga, especially as I continue to  add blocks of new colors, it can seem like trying to juggle too many balls at the same time. With reduction cuts I was exhausted by the time I was done. Moku hanga can proceed at a much calmer pace, though of course this wasn't true  when it was done in its heyday in Japan I imagine since it was a business. But for me the lack of solvents, the ease of  printing, even though I recall that my first print proved no easier and probably harder than my first reduction print, the small space required to both carve and print all make it something that fits easily into my life. In many ways  it seems organic.

I say 'pick your poison'  in the title because the difficulty of both can make  them both occasionally seem like two unpleasant choices. But they both can create wonderful prints. The difference  I guess is that moku hang always seems to carry its own antidote  to the poison. Just sit back and take your time.

Speaking of Pennants

Halloween Pennant. Watercolor Sketch by Ken Januski

There was a time in recent memory when you could say pennant in Philadelphia and people would think about the Phillies. But I'm afraid, barring a miracle, that those days are past. Today when I hear pennant, well at least after today, I think of dragonflies.

Anyone who has looked through field guides, bird, dragonfly or anything else has probably experienced the desire to see one or two particular species in the guide. That's been the case with me and the Halloween Pennant. Today I finally saw one at Morris Arboretum. It's the first pennant I've ever seen and my list of species has now gotten up to about 25 I'd guess. Nothing to brag about but at least enough for me to begin to feel like I know my way around a bit. I'm not totally flummoxed by every one I see.

Though I took numerous photos of dragonflies over the last few days I always hate to rely on them. I prefer always to show a sketch or painting. Above is a smallish 9x12 pencil and watercolor sketch on Stillman and Birn Zeta paper. It's the first time I've tried the Zeta paper for watercolor and it's worked very well.

I always avoid painting every feather when I paint birds. In fact I'd probably have a nervous breakdown if I even tried. It seems better to me to know enough about birds and their feathers to be able to use a shorthand to indicate them. But what do you do with the complex venation of dragonflies? Well I haven't found the answer yet. But the watercolor above includes one attempt. I added white gouache to also indicate many of the highlights in the veins.

Halloween Pennant at Morris Arboretum. Photo  by Ken Januski.

Though I'm fairly happy with the watercolor sketch you can see from the photo above just how much I've failed to capture. Since it is such a beautiful dragonfly I decided I just had to show one photo. The one I saw constantly landed on the top of some 2 foot high vegetation. When I got home and read about pennants I found that's typical, and in fact may be the origin of its name.

Slaty Skimmer at Manayunk Canal. Photo by Ken Januski.

Another truly beautiful dragonfly I saw for the first time in the last few days is the Slaty Skimmer above. There is a purple cast to its abdomen that makes it a very striking dragonfly. Though the body is completely black the abdomen is affected by what is called pruinosity , a type of bloom that lightens the color of many dragonflies. I think its soberly elegant slaty black/purple is the perfect complement to the colorful oranges of the Halloween Pennant.

Eastern Amberwing at Manayunk Canal. Photo by Ken Januski.

The second smallest dragonfly in the Eastern US, at least from what I've read, is the Eastern Amberwing. Above is one of the best photos I've ever gotten of it. About a year ago Jerene and I tried to see it as it landed in the water in front of us. But we just couldn't get a good view. And the photos were too small to be much help. The one thing I noticed is that it reminded me of the small planes you tend to see in early movies, biplanes I think. And there was an occasional glint of amber. Now that I have a better photo I see why it reminded me of a biplane. It has both short wings and torso, unlike most dragonflies.

Widow Skimmer at Morris Arboretum. Photo by Ken Januski.

And speaking of elegance above is the Widow Skimmer. Who would have thought that black and white could be so striking?

I don't like to show photos as most readers know. But I've seen such a wealth of handsome dragonflies recently that I decided to succumb to the temptation. Back in the studio I'm still trying to figure out what the next linocut will be.