Placid    8x5 Monoprint
  This idea was very productive with many unusual resolutions.  I will use this matrix, or parts of it, in future prints.       The figure at the bottom is clearer in most of the series,  but they all seem to be dealing with opening to awareness, wholeness (circles) or Light.  This print is full of imperfections but these, in some way, add to the loose and subtle harmonies of color and symbol.   I will attach below a little description of my process on the press.

 my process on the press…..bob phinney

invention and trial, two of the many qualities of the mono-print process.  Sometimes a printing run will be disastrous, ruining a promising print, another print might just never resolve, but then there are those that so surprise you with subtlety, texture and unexpected coherence that they carry you along to the next happy discovery.

I’ve used plexiglass and an embossed (engraved) cardboard plate on many of these prints.  A layer or layers of ink are then rolled on.  The ink viscosity differences allow for inking multi-colored layers before printing.  A second run off a printed plate gives a “ghost” image.  Layering these ghosts builds up the amazing subtlety and texture. A third ghost done on a stencil paper allows you to cut stencils for the next rolled-up plate or serve as masks for further color areas.  Plates can also be cut from this inexpensive cardboard, inked and arranged on top of a larger inked plate.  This produces a halo around each cut out shape.  There a myriad other techniques to be discovered in the process of developing your ideas.

I still love working in nature with pencil or brush, but i’ve gotten the feeling I’m trying to push her into a corner.  Mono-printing is like stepping into the stream….ironic, this flow issuing from such a rudimentary machine.

Home Journey    8"x5"mono print

ARTIST’S STATEMENT……………….SPICE OF LIFE

  Variety is the spice of life, and this has been, for me, an informing truth in all my art expression.  Or you might just say…… I have a short attention span.   It seems that I just get something figured out and i am impelled to go on to something else…  This quirk shows itself to be an ally in the monoprint and monotype process.

So many things in our lives tend to evolve into something repetitive,  ponderous and not fun.  Variety helps remedy this.  Easing up helps…… Appreciating and learning to go with the flow helps…… And getting quiet and focussed enough to be truly in the present moment really helps.  This is what has inspired the mono prints I have been working with lately.  Variety, that's the easy part.

If you are not understanding the imagery in the prints, that’s ok; the image isn’t the message!……I did not set out to understand what they mean but only to release the urge to copy anything (even nature) and let the prints evolve and resolve themselves (and myself) according to intuited and chance stages.  Finding the meaning is really up to you.
The more you work with a plate the more refined and complex the harmonies and surprises become.  Comfort with ambiguity and change, thats what I’m after. 

I hope this work (play ) entertains and gratifies  you……it does this for me!

Cloud and Trigram    12"x9" Monotype
   
 Unlike my more recent monoprints, this was done on a plexiglass plate.  Having no "matrix" or engraved plate that would produce a continuous quality or character through a print series, this is properly called a monotype.  (aficionados please comment here!)
 A trigram is a Chinese symbol made up of three lines, either broken (yin) or unbroken (yang).  The second (from the bottom ) is a yin  line  The third line  here is yet ambiguous and appears to be in the process of change.  The eye shape might suggest consciousness, the circle motives suggests both unity and separateness, Movement is indicated by the cloudy shapes above.... I could go on but I'm getting that uncomfortable feeling you get in most Art History classes.  This is one of my favorite attempts at following shape and color toward an idea.  You can see; I'm still having fun with it.

Hydroponic pill

"Hydroponic pill"   The pill is obvious, but Hydroponic?! Maybe the leaves.....something productive?  I could go on but it's just another intuitive aspect of the process that I really don't want to pin down.  it's fun anyway.

Come together

"Come together" reminds me of the Beatles' song and of the sentiment of harmony that drives the prints in this series.