Interview with Katie Bonadies, September 2023
Liz is a watercolor and oil painter who has recently turned to printmaking. She has been at RWS since September 2022.
Liz recently retired as a Structural Engineer from GE Aircraft where she made sure engines didn’t break under use. She says printmaking satisfies her mathematical brain. She uses woodblocks to create reduction prints, a process by which a block of wood is carved and re-carved every time a new layer of color is introduced into the print from light to dark. The block is destroyed in reduction printing; there is no room for error in this process because once the carved surface is gone it’s gone, it cannot be added back. The first layer of ink is put down before the block has been carved. The process requires carving away anything you want to remain the established colors because the cut away areas won't pick up ink. Print the next color and repeat the process until the last layer has been printed, “You’re always doing the reverse, and printing reverse you’re thinking negative is positive and working on the last color you printed when you are carving.” Multiple editions have to be made at the same time.
Liz discovered reduction woodblock years ago from the artist Jenny Pope who she met at a craft fair. She had never heard of reduction prints and Liz quickly fell in love with the process. She has never done any other kind of printmaking and is self-taught, learning through trial and error, using the internet and other printmakers as a resource.
While she was living in Arizona, Liz volunteered at The Drawing Studio where she had access to a printmaking room and a press where she got to try reduction printmaking for the first time. She enjoys the constraints of the process because it takes her in new directions, “Once you start doing it, the limitations assert themselves and you get taken somewhere else by that, and that’s great.” She recently moved back to the East Coast from Arizona where she lived for the past three years. The majority of her work depicts landscapes, and she has a backlog of ideas that she’s been working through. She is particularly interested in the extraterrestrial feel of the white rock formations in the Southwest, “I can’t believe that the planet can do this.” She loves Maine, too–she’s just not really ‘here yet’.
Liz currently has twenty prints that are a block of orange sky. She explains, “Painting is a much more spontaneous process; in printmaking there is so much you have to do before you even get any kind of image.” Before printing twenty blocks of orange sky, she had to decide on the size of the block and spent a lot of time on the image. Then she cut the paper, and made a holder for the block so that the registration lined up correctly so that she could do all of the registration. (Registration is what ensures the paper is lined up properly so that each layer of the woodcut is printed in the same place every time.) Liz creates a mat with registration pins at the top and a cut out where the block fits. The paper has tabs at the top that fit over the registration pins so that the paper is overlaid in the same place every time.
Liz is compelled to create. She had a father who painted and her parents had an art book of impressionist paintings that she spent hours pouring over. Liz also credits Ellen Lyons, a great teacher she had in high school, for bringing painting into her life and spent a year drawing at the Museum School in Boston. Making art feels like something that’s her own, “It’s something that you own and you get to say what it’s going to look like. Nobody has any other kind of interest in it.” She’s thrilled by shapes and colors. One of the reasons she became an engineer is because she got to draw all the time.
Liz was reluctant to join a group studio when she moved to the area. She thought sharing space with others would be a hassle–an opinion based on previous experience–but joined Running With Scissors because she needed a space to work outside of her home. “I am completely turned around on how much I love coming here. The people are so respectful, helpful and nice.” Liz loves being able to use the big presses and work in the communal areas of the Print Shop and interact with other members to get their feedback, “It works really well. It’s great.”
View more of Liz’s artwork on her website, lizwhitbeck.com and contact her through email at lizwhitbeck@gmail.com.
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