Printing Master Classes
The Roxbury Arts Group is presenting 2-day intensive printmaking workshops by two of the area’s finest and most admired printmakers, Lisbeth Firmin and Gerda Van Leeuwen. They recently shared an exhibit at The Walt Meade Gallery in Roxbury, and the workshops will teach the techniques represented in this very popular exhibit.
On June 7th and 14th from noon to 5 pm, Lisbeth Firmin will demonstrate and teach her reductive monoprinting processes. This workshop for both the professional artist and the beginner requires no drawing or painting skills. Registrants should bring a brown bag lunch, cut plexiglass in assorted sizes up to 22”x 30” . Paper will be available for sale.
On June 21 and 28th Artist Gerda Van Leeuwen will demonstrate how to work with rust on paper. Students will learn how to build up colorful backgrounds in order to transform images into a bold "rust" work. Students are invited to bring flat rusty objects to experiment with. A fun, hands-on workshop for all ages.
Both workshops will be held at The Hudson Press, Carol Hinkley Road, Roxbury. Each 2-day session is $100 plus a $10 materials fee. Pre-registration is a must. (607) 326-7908.
Firmin, who makes her home in Franklin, NY, is a contemporary American realist who shows regularly in New York City, Provincetown, Seattle and Santa Fe. For over three decades her work has been in hundreds of solo and group shows across the country and internationally. Her monoprints were featured in a solo exhibition in Lima, Peru, at the Institute of Culture in 1999. Her most recent solo show was at the Klaudia Marr Gallery, Santa Fe, NM in December, 2007.
Awards include a 2007 New York State Foundation for the Arts Fellowship for printmaking, a Pollock-Krasner Foundation Grant, the New York Print Club Emerging Artist Award, the CCVA Award (awarded by Michael Gitlitz, Director, Marlborough Gallery) at the Chautauqua Center for the Visual Arts, first prize of $5000.00 in the LANA International Arts Competition (awarded by Wayne Thiebaud) along with full fellowships to the MacDowell Colony, National Seashore Residency, the Vermont Studio Center and the Saltonstall Arts Colony. She has been a guest artist (printmaking) at the Vermont Studio School from 2001 to 2004.
Her work is in several public collections including the New York Historical Society, Fleming Museum, University of Texas and Hofstra University. Corporate collections include Pfizer, Bankers Trust, I/B/E/S, Odyssey, Fidelity Investments, Cablevision and Zurich Insurance. Private collectors include Philip Glass, Night Shayamalan and Robert Rothchild. Recent publications include The Boston Globe, Art and Auction, Art of Our Town, calendar, 2006, New York Times (twice), Arts Magazine, The Banner (Provincetown), The Albuquerque Journal and the Sarasota Herald-Tribune.
Firmin teaches several painting/printmaking workshops throughout the year at Great River Arts Institute, VT, UCCCA (Upper Catskill Community Council of the Arts) , West Kortright Center, NY, North Carolina School of the Arts, Winston Salem, NC and Truro Center for the Arts, Castle Hill, Cape Cod.
Van Leeuwen was born in the Netherlands and lived for many years in New York City where she co-established the etching and lithography facilities of Hudson Street Press and supervised production there as Technical Advisor and participated in various exhibits of prints published by the Press. In 2005, she and her husband Peter Yamaoka, the founder of Hudson Street Press moved the press facilities to Roxbury, NY, where it publishes editions under the name of Hudsonpress.
Since moving to the Catskills, van Leeuwn’s work has been greatly influenced by the natural environment of the area.
Van Leeuwen’s work is held in several private collections, and she has exhibited widely in solo and group exhibitions throughout the United States, Europe and Asia.