After individually scanning 34 individual 3" x 5"cards, I am happy to say that I have officially added my 2005 collection of gouache pigment linoleum prints, Ruminate.
Ruminate 28 Gouache pigment linoleum print
The series is printed on discarded card catalogs from the Wilson Library at the University of Minnesota. I was an art student at the U of MN, when I noticed one day that the scratch paper the librarians had distributed had type-written text on the back and have a hole punched through it. Being the ephemera enthusiast that I was, and still am, I took this opportunity to run (literally, as I assumed there would be other art students with the same idea) from station to station and collect the lot of these beautiful relics of libraries past.
History of the Land in Yellow
I hung on to the cards, waiting for the perfect project. I began working on a painting History of the Land in Yellow (left) where the finishing touch was an image of a buffalo lumbering out of the composition. (click for larger image)
Cottonwood
Also, around this time received a scholarship to the Split Rock Arts Program Printmaking; East Meets West, where I studied the Japanese tradition of woodblock printmaking with gouache pigments. Cottonwood (right) is my favorite example of the prints I created during this workshop.
The combination of these two projects inspired the framework for the series that would be worthy of my treasured discarded card catalogs.
Ruminate is one of my favorite collections. The sole buffalo compliments the archaic typed and stamped cards. As a series, the repetitious herd forces you to ruminate the layers of text and pigment.
The entire series can be view here.
