past show

Strata is an exhibition of new and recent work by notable Boston-area printmakers Anne Silber, Ellen Shattuck Pierce, Marc Cote and Susan Jaworski-Stranc.  Strata focuses on the versatility of printmaking, and the means by which ink can be manipulated to create infinite layers of meaning.  Together the show's four artists employ stencil-based serigraphy, linoleum-block and woodblock printing to produce worlds that can be serene, humorous or meditative. 

Anne Silber, the lone seriographer, uses stencils to force smooth layers of semi-transparent ink onto paper.  In much the way of a watercolorist, she distills scenes of the natural world into essential color blocks with few lines separating them from one another. Silber's work is included in the permanent collections of the Brooklyn Museum, the Rose Art Museum and the Worcester Art Museum; and it has appeared in movies such as Charlie Wilson's War, First Wives Club and The Departed.

Susan Jaworski-Stranc is one of two artists in Strata who employ linoleum blocks in the printmaking process. Carving a single plate out of linoleum, then repeatedly inking and pressing it to paper, Stranc gradually builds representational scenes and symbolic compositions, such as silhouettes denoting winter's approach. Her color sensibilities might appear similar to Silber's but closer inspection reveals the chance print marks of linoleum. Stranc's books and prints have been exhibited at the Danforth Museum, the DeCordova Museum and the New Britain Museum of American Art; and they are part of the permanent collections of Boston's Museum of Fine Arts and the University of California.

The work of Ellen Shattuck Pierce, also a linoleum-block printer, uses intricate black-ink lines that define compositional elements and clearly separate blocks of color. Of late Pierce has been using this technique to depict domestic scenes that clash with contemporary ideals of domestic bliss. Her frequently stressed-out themes suggest states to which any mindful but overworked parent could relate, such as a family meal that devolves into a dinner-plate battle scene atop fine table linens in Dead Meat. A native Vermonter, Pierce now lives in Boston and her work has been exhibited in museums and galleries across Canada, Massachusetts, New York, Arkansas and Wisconsin.

Marc Cote's woodblock prints frequently bear residual grain textures that remind viewers of medieval illustrations. It is a reasonable connection since many of his subjects are strange icons and historical events that time seems to have forgotten.  The palindromically titled print Darn Ocelots Stole Conrad, for instance, depicts a team of ocelots - now an endangered species - carries a man off to a hinterland. Were the affronting party an eagle or a pack of wolves, references could be made to ancient tales. But ocelots? Myths, Cote reminds us, have to start somewhere. Cote is the chairperson of the Art and Music Department of Framingham State College, and he sits on the boards of trustees of Boston Printmakers and the Danforth Museum. His work is included in the permanent collections of Harvard University, the University of Wisconsin and the Danforth Museum. Coincident with Strata, Cote will be the subject of a one-man show at the Art Academy of Krakow in Poland.