Woodcuts: the artist-designer is also the craftsman/craftswoman

Today I climbed up to the fifth floor of the library... selected a small armload of books... took them back down a few flights, located a table and chair...

Honor Thy Father and Thy Mother by Dorothea Braby 1956

Here are some quick snaps I took to accompany my notes. The book was called Women Engravers by Patricia Jaffé, 1988. It was a long essay in a slightly over-sized, paperback format with a plenitude of these wonderful, enormous reproductions. And these pictures came with an equally illuminating text, which was nice.

I have been making lino-block prints recently, and wanted to investigate some different techniques... perhaps things I couldn't necessarily discover on my own. Overall, I found this to be a very good read... just a sweet, brief history of women engravers in the Western world, mostly in the 19th century.

This type of art has been a slowly-acquired taste for me... it seems to have taken my whole life up to this point to slowly fall in love with wood cut images. It probably started with The Ninth Gate -- a film with many great props, but particularly the book at the crux of the story. It is one of the most tangible movie props that live in my imagination... right up there with the Auryn-adorned copy of the Never-Ending Story.

I feel placified -- my eyes refreshed -- as though I'll never look at engravings in the same way again. I love the Arts & Crafts movement. I remember a time in my life when I turned my nose up at those words, and now I can't get enough.

And so, it was with immense satisfaction that I climbed back up to the fifth floor and returned the book to its place, for it was a good book. It had served its purpose: I learned many useful things. I knew I'd been missing something, and it had annoyed me... but tonight I go to bed understanding engraving a little better than I did this morning. Now to put these new ideas into practice. To sleep on them and to meditate on them. 

Another book tomorrow.