Starting My Third Year of Moku Hanga Prints

Purple Finch and Hairy Woodpecker. Moku Hanga print by Ken Januski. Edition not complete as of 02.10.19 but it will be between 20 and 25. Printed on Echizen Kozo paper.

The title is true and accurate but it's possibly misleading. I did make my first moku hanga print at the beginning of 2017. I did that largely because I'd seen the prints of one wildlife artist in particular who used and still uses moku hanga to make brilliantly colored, quite creative prints. His colors in particular seemed to offer something richer than what I was getting in my previous linocuts and woodcuts. I'm not naming names here, more for privacy reasons than anything else, of that artist or of another family that was also instrumental in my deciding to try moku hanga. The family bought a large number of my works in late 2016 and it was the proceeds of those sales which helped to fund most of my early moku hanga supplies. So I first should say thanks to both the artist and the family. If you read this I imagine you will know who you are.

Back to why the title might be misleading though. The fact is that the print at top of this post is only my sixth moku hanga print!! What can I say? As soon as I tried my first moku hanga print I loved the possibilities that I was now seeing first  hand. On the other hand when I made that first print technical difficulties required me to yell out to my wife that I'd have to skip lunch and then as the day went on I had to yell out again and ask if we could delay supper.

Everything went wrong!! The paper was too wet or too dry. I had all sorts of splotches in my print rather than the smooth, rich, even color I was expecting. My fingers got  paint on them and they went onto the paper. I can't even remember everything that went wrong. I do know that the prints  did not look as similar to one another as I would have liked(that is an understatement!!).

But still the possibilities were obvious. In other words I was hooked. I haven't done any other types of printmaking since then. But given all the problems I encountered I knew that I would have to modify what I did in moku hanga to some extent. For  one thing I wasn't going to be able to carve small outlines around every shape. If I'd taken a course I might have learned this right off. But I learned everything from books and trial and error.

Anyone who does moku hanga printmaking I think will tell you how complicated  it can be. There are so many variables, so many things to learn, and such a rich tradition to contend with. To make a long story short I had to learn how to approach moku hanga in a way that made sense for me.

It's also true that after an initial start in printmaking of just using anything as a subject I've gotten more and more ambitious.  I want my prints to some extent to be the same as paintings, just done as multiples. So I wanted ambitous prints, but using a medium in which I was a rank beginner.

The end result is that it takes me a long time before I decided to actually make a new print. I may spend months toying around with various possibilities. So.................. that is why I say that this is my third year of making moku hanga prints. It's 100 percent true. I just haven't done many during that time.

I think that the first print in which I haven't felt the need to tear my hair out as I printed the edition is  this one of  a female Purple Finch and male Hairy Woodpecker. I had few if any problems in the first edition of 20 on Nishinouchi paper.  Well major problems I should say. There were some minor problems, like ink coverage. But the new, as yet unfinished edition on Echizen Kozo, printed at top seemed to have fewer problems with ink coverage. Until the paper seemed to pull off the page as I printed additonal prints!! I  think that problem is resolving itself and so all in all this will be a second edition of about 20, with, I hope, better ink coverage.

Printing the Purple Finch has been the first time that I've largely liked the process. I'm not screaming and tearing out my hair as I print part of the edition each day. And I'm quite happy with the results.

So as I start my third year of moku hanga I have to say it seems the perfect medium for  me as a printmaker. I don't need to use toxic chemicals. I don't need a printing press. I don't need a lot of room. I do all my printing in my very small studio(once a bedroom). I think all artists hope for the day when their tools  become an extension of  their  hands. That is now the case with me and moku hanga. There are still a million ways I'm sure in which the technique can become better and more predictable. But it is predictable enough right now. I feel very fortunate to have stumbled into moku hanga.

I should add that this print was based on an actual scene at The Wissahickon Environmental Center in late 2018. It is based on sketches and photos I made on a very misty, foggy day. I've tried to keep some of that sense in the print.

Highlights of the Natural Year - 2015, Part 4

Black and White Warbler. Photo by Ken Januski.

As I finish off this roundup of the natural year in Philadelphia in 2015 I'm reminded of one of the more interesting warbler facts: there seemed to be far more in the fall than in the spring! We did spend a few days at Cape May in the spring and might have missed a few because of that but I think that in general warblers were just missing in action in the spring. So it was great to be able to see so many in the fall, including the common Black and White Warbler pictured above.

Great Blue Heron and Common Yellowthroat. Sumi Brush Pen Field Sketch by Ken Januski.

CommonYellowthroat at Houston Meadows. Watercolor and Brush Pen Painting by Ken Januski.

Far more common than the Black and White Warbler in Philadelphia is the Common Yellowthroat. And yet, at least in NW Philadelphia where we do most of our birding, there just didn't seem to be many. So when they finally started appearing in numbers in September all was well again with this species. Above is a sumi brush pen field sketch that served as the basis for the watercolor and pen painting done later that same day.

Common Buckeye. Photo by Ken Januski.

Blue-headed Vireo. Photo by Ken Januski.

Along with warbler came many butterflies, dragonflies and other birds. Though it's hard to beat being out on an early May morning seeing birds in particular, it's almost as exciting being out as mornings start to cool in September and finding vireos, warblers and other birds as well as both dragonflies and butterflies. One of the most common butterflies this fall and many falls is the Common Buckeye, pictured above. Though like dragonflies their flatness makes them hard to work into an artistic composition. One bird we always love seeing, largely because it used to nest outside our cabin at Shenandoah National Park, is the Blue-headed Vireo. And each year the same thing happens. I keep trying to puzzle out which warbler it is, until I figure out that it isn't!

Marbled Godwit at Heinz NWR. Photo by Ken Januski.

We don't see many godwits anywhere so when one or more Marbled Godwits hung around Heinz for more than a day we had to go down and look for them. Hardly had we started walking through Warbler Woods, looking out to the impoundment to the right, than we say this one. This definitely was a highlight of the year. Soon after one or more Hudsonian Godwits were also found I believe but we weren't able to get to Heinz to look for them. Three is only so much time in the day.

Pectoral Sandpiper at Morris Wetlands. Sumi Brush Pen and Watercolor Painting by Ken Januski.

Another shorebird that we don't see all that often is the Pectoral Sandpiper. Above is the first one we ever saw at Morris Arboretum. It stayed for a couple of days, when the wetlands water level was extremely low, and turned out to be the last shorebird we saw in Philadelphia in 2015(barring a Killdeer I think, and they can be here all year long).

Purple Finch in Sweetgum. Photo by Ken Januski.

Well I have to say that Purple Finches are a highlight of both this year and last year. After years of rarely seeing them anywhere, most particularly in Philadelphia, we saw them everywhere we went in NW Philadelphia for a 2-4 week period in October of last year. We hoped that would happen again this year but I believe we saw them just once, at Andorra Natural Area, feeding with American Goldfinches and their rarer cousins, Pine Siskins. As I said a real treat!

Sharp-shinned Hawk in Backyard. Photo by Ken Januski.

November and December really are the months for woodpeckers and raptors. It was very hard to choose what to show. That mature Bald Eagle flying over our heads as we got into our car at Morris Arboretum? The Red-shouldered Hawk at the Manayunk Canal? Any of the many Pileated Woodpecker photos I've taken during the last two months? Finally I decided on this much more common bird, mainly because it's such a nice photo I think. This adult Sharp-shinned Hawk was all over our backyard and that of our neighbors hunting our feeder birds. Even with the extraordinarily warm weather I think we will continue to see Sharpies and Coopers for the next few months.

What a great year it has been and how lucky those people are I think who can take enjoyment from the cycles of nature.

The Most Important Thing in Wildlife Art...

Osprey in Tree. Brush Pen Sketch by Ken Januski.

is getting a sense of the life and movement of the subject. A bold statement I suppose and one that many would argue with. But for me I'll quickly say that if I can't see the whole bird, animal, insect or whatever in a piece of wildlife art I'll quickly surmise that the artist is working from a photo which does not in fact show the entire subject and he's loathe to try to imagine what he can't see. It's easier to just crop everything out and hope that the flat, abstract design will be appealing enough to counter the fact that the artist has not shown how the weight of the subject is distributed, where the body is moving, where the eye is glancing, etc. It almost never is enough to counter that huge loss.

I say this mainly because I'm very familiar with it. It is the problem that stopped me cold when I first started wildlife, specifically bird, art. I was completely unsuccessful working from life, mainly because birds wouldn't sit still. And my own photos, the only ones that it seemed right to work from, almost always left part of the bird hidden. Even today it's a great treat to be able occasionally to be able to see the whole bird. I think that is one of the appeals of shorebirds. Often you can see the entire bird. As a bonus it often sits still.

In any case this lack of knowledge of the entire bird still stops me from choosing to work from over 50% of the photos I've taken. The only mitigating factor is that I now have about 7-8 years experience sketching from life and I've learned enough about birds to make a good guess as to how the bird fits together, even when I can't see everything. But the most thrilling photos I take are the ones that show the complete bird in an intriguing posture. Those pictures are irresistible and I want to try to capture some sense of the movement in them.

So when winter comes and I spend much less time outside, especially sketching outside, I often will concentrate on doing sketches from my photos which show the full subject, mainly birds, but often insects and other subjects. All of the brush sketches on this page were done in the last week or so. And in almost all instance I did them because I could see the entire subject.

For me this will always be far more exciting, whether in my work or in some one else's, than the most elaborate reconstruction of feathers. It is the life of the subjects I see that I want to understand and portray, even when I work abstractly, and I just cringe when instead I stumble upon well delineated feathers and feather tracts. The latter may be beautiful but rarely does it have any sense of life.

American Copper, American Lady and Common Buckeye. Brush Pen Sketch by Ken Januski.

Osprey in Flight. Brush Pen Sketch by Ken Januski.

Purple Finch Eating Crabapples. Brush Pen Sketch by Ken Januski.

Red Knot. Brush Pen Sketch by Ken Januski.

Red Knot and Semi-palmated Sandpiper. Brush Pen and Watercolor Sketch by Ken Januski.

Zabulon Skipper. Brush Pen Sketch by Ken Januski.

Reconciling Naturalism and Abstraction

Dead Tree Along Kankakee River. Lithograph by Ken Januski.

The recent sale of an older abstract work, Chesnut Park Number 16, along with the completion of a watercolor sketch of a juvenile Purple Finch based on a sighting last week reminded me of how much my art has often fluctuated between abstraction and naturalism and/or realism.

In looking for a very old etching I did that married abstraction and naturalism to some extent I ran across the lithograph pictured above. I've never formally studied woodblock or linoleum block printing, my current printing media. My first actual study of printmaking was in the basement of the UC Berkeley Student Union, thus the name of my etsy store berkeleySU, and the subject was lithography.

Since I did strictly abstract art for so many years after getting my MA from Berkeley and only recently turned to naturalism I'm always a but surprised to see something like the print above. Obviously there is a realistic subject but I tried to hide it pretty well, concentrating instead of both composition and the process of lithography, experimenting to see what types of marks I could get. Still I did like the idea of combining the two. I hope that perhaps this explains a bit why I continue to stay away from naturalism that is particularly straightforward.

Chestnut Park Number 16. Charcoal Drawing by Ken Januski.

When I moved to Philadelphia around 30 years ago my first works were abstract charcoal drawings like the one pictured above. It's 23x29 inches and titled Chestnut Park Number 16. The entire series was called Chestnut Park, Chestnut because my studio was on Chestnut Street almost next door to the Ben Franklin Hotel, and park because I felt that my shapes were getting more organic, like critters you might see in a park.

I've always liked this work even though I no longer work in this style. Because I'm still quite fond of it and think that it is of high quality I also have some of it for sale on a separate etsy store, OldAndAbstract. I was happily surprised to sell my first work from that store just recently.

Juvenile Purple Finch in Dogwood. Watercolor Sketch by Ken Januski.

As I've said here more than once before when I got disgusted with the contemporary art world and could no longer see a viable place for myself in it I eventually turned to naturalism, first insects found in the garden and drawn while viewed under a dissecting microscope and finally birds, in about 2006. I quickly realized how little I knew about birds, even though I'd been birding for 10 years or so at that point. It has been a long struggle to be able to understand them and to be able to draw or paint them successfully.

Soon after I started I realized I'd get nowhere working from photos and that I needed to work from life in order to truly understand birds. Easier said than done but I can say that today I'm at least somewhat comfortable working from life. And because of that I'm also more comfortable working from my own photos when there's a compelling need. The small watercolor sketch above is such an instance. We rarely see Purple Finches in Philadelphia. But last Sunday we saw four at the Andorra Natural Area, an adult male and female and two juveniles. I have to assume that they were a migrating family but that could easily be wrong. I wanted to be certain of their ID so I spent most of my time taking photos and one sketching. But the image stuck with me.

I particularly was struck by the scruffy plumage of the juvenile above. So yesterday and today I did this watercolor and pencil sketch based on one of the photos. I'd like to do something that combines both adults and juvenile but that is a bit ambitious so I'm not sure when I'll actually take it up.

When I do though, most likely once again I'll try to reconcile abstraction and naturalism. Who knows what might turn up?

Eastern Towhee Continued

Eastern Towhee at Houston Meadows. In-process Acrylic Painting by Ken Januski.

We were birding at Fort Washington State Park - Militia Hill today, killing time while waiting for our cat to finish at the vet. At one point a thoroughly recognizable shape hopped out into the path. It was an Eastern Towhee. I think because I've been spending so much time painting it the shape was instantly recognizable. We've actually been surprised at how often they can be found at this location in late fall and winter.

The high point though was a handsome Purple Finch, either female or first year just a few feet away from us. We rarely see them in this area of Pennsylvania so it was a pleasant surprise, especially as the predictions are for no irruption of northern finches into areas south this year.

When we got home, cat safely in tow, I decided to grab just a little time to continue work on this painting. There's still a lot of work to do, especially in incorporating its surroundings. But I am happy with its progress.