The Nautilus and the Ammonite is now for sale!

Announcing the release of The Nautilus and the Ammonite! 

The Nautilus and the Ammonite is my latest book project. It features an anonymous poem that I simply fell in love with. The poem dates back to the 1800’s, an era when the science of paleontology was still taking its first steps. Its narrative follows two ancient mollusks, friends who together witness the last days of the Cretaceous, and one - the Ammonite - who is lost in the same event that took the dinosaurs.

This book is unique in that it juxtaposes old fashioned poetic language with contemporary visual art. The result is a volume that explores scientific questions about our world while contemplating philosophical implications in a way that is as emotionally responsive as it is brainy. 

You can view all the artwork and hear the poem in a Read Aloud version of the book on YouTube found here. 

The book is 9" x 12" Smythe sewn case bind (hardcover,) color offset printing, 32 pages plus printed end sheets. First edition of 300. Retail price of $20.00. 
Get a signed copy (FREE SHIPPING for US customers) by contacting me directly at marfknox (at) gmail (dot) com with the subject line "Nautilus and Ammonite". 

The Nautilus and the Ammonite Pre-Sale Campaign is Launched!

Almost three years in the making and now The Nautilus and the Ammonite Pres-sale Campaign is LIVE! For those who don't know about it, check out the video above. I have 6 weeks to raise funds needed to print a first edition of 500. Check it out and please share with any potentially interested friends through email, Facebook, Twitter, word of mouth, etc. - it all helps. Thanks so much! 

Nautilus and Ammonite: Summer Smiles

The next finished artwork for the Nautilus and the Ammonite book project. This is the fourth stanza and also the fourth double-page spread.

They swam 'mid isles whose summer smiles Were dimmed by no alloy; Whose groves were palm, whose air was balm, And life one only joy.

Nautilus and Ammonite: Sinking Into the Deep

The next finished artwork for the Nautilus and the Ammonite book project. This is the second stanza and also the second double-page spread. 

For each could swim on the ocean's brim,
     And, when wearied, its sail could furl,
And sink to sleep in the great sea-deep,
     In its palace all of pearl.  

Nautilus and Ammonite: Friendly Strife

The next finished artwork for the Nautilus and the Ammonite book project. It is here that the young, twin sisters of the sea meet for the first time. 






The nautilus and the ammonite
     Were launched in friendly strife,
Each sent to float in its tiny boat
     On the wide, wide sea of life. 

Nautilus and Ammonite: Plesiosaur Pages

Plesiosaur  and Plesiosaur Fossil  
Double page spreads 11-12 and 13-14 
Screenprint, woodcut, linocut, watercolor, and collage on Rives BFK 
22” x 14” each 

Sometimes it's hard to get a project started, and other times it's difficult to complete one. Especially if the process is lengthy. I have already enjoyed many successes along the way to creating the artwork for my third book, but making final, permanent decisions about works can be rather daunting. Particularly, I worry about overworking a piece and inadvertently destroying the most lively aspects of what I've already done.

Just over a year ago I completed the storyboard, dummy book, and screenprinted backgrounds and began linocuts and woodcuts for the pages in The Nautilus and the Ammonite book. However, I had not yet finished any artwork of actual pages until this week. The idea for the project came almost two years ago, and I had done some preparatory work for it with sketches and learning to make screenprints, but the project really got off the ground during my residency last September at Sunny Point. Unfortunately, soon after that residency I ended having to sell my house and move, and so the project was put on the backburner for months, and it is only recently that I've been very slowly pulling myself (dragging, really) back into the mindset necessary to complete the work.

These are the first two completed artwork for double-page spreads, not including the text that will eventually be added. I was so afraid to pull the trigger on making final decisions for these works, but now that I've done it I am quite pleased with the results. I don't think I'll be diving back into this project at full speed, but this is at least the catalyst I needed to at least pick up the pace and feel more confident about the direction the project is taking.

The text that is meant to accompany these pages goes as such:

And the monsters vast of ages past

They beheld in their ocean caves;

They saw them ride in their power and pride,

And sink in their deep-sea graves.

Fibonacci Numbers and Spirals

4" x 4" (image)
4-color reduction woodcut
Edition of 7 on various types and size sheets of white paper

As I made this latest ammonite print I thought, This is the last one. I've done enough of them, and there's no where else I want to go with it. 

But after it was finished, I felt somewhat differently - like I'm giving up on a quest. I've been making prints of ammonites for about a year and a half now, and I feel that this whole time I've been grasping to get hold of certain things, some of which I've found, but others which I've yet to discover.

The problem is that I question whether mathematically intriguing and aesthetically captivating spirals found in the impressions of once flourishing creatures that went extinct millions of years ago is a combination of thoughts so mind-blowing in-of-itself that I'm just being silly trying to capture something about it in art. This is the reason I never paint sunsets; they are so awe-inspiring to experience in reality, what the hell would I do with that in art?

Argh, what to do? Think on it some more, I suppose. Better yet, get back to work on my picture book "The Nautilus and the Ammonite." In completing that project, maybe I will figure out whether and how I might continue this related body of work.

Reduction Relief Prints by 6th Graders at Kearny

Today I finished up a session with two classes (46 kids total) of 6th graders at Gen. Philip Kearny School. This was through the Wagner Free Institute for Science's SNAP (Science, Nature and Art in Philadelphia) program.

The kids were learning geology in their science class and I came as a visiting artist to lead two art projects that connected with what they were learning. We focused on layers and textures, and this second project was making a two-layer reduction relief print using 4" x 6" EZ Cut blocks and water-based printing ink. The students' drawings were inspired by ammonite fossils.

I snapped photos of my favorite prints, but there were so many more! The kids were high energy, the teacher was excited and supportive, and the final work wowed everyone involved. We had a fantastic time and I hope I'm sent back next year.

Hand-colored Ammonite Fossils

I hand-colored a few of the artist's proofs I made of my ammonite fossil prints for Builderblocks (see this post.) These two are now for sale on my Etsy store here and here.

Pair of Ammonite Fossils for the Builderblock Collection

I just finished carving and proofing my first submissions to Totemic17's Builderblock collection. This is a collection of 7cm square woodcut blocks from various artists that art-lovers can mix and match and order to be printed into original multi-block prints for purchase. Artists send in the carved blocks and Totemic17 prints and publishes them with a bio and URL on the webiste. The artists' are compensated $5. (50%) every time their blocks are selected by a collector making a purchase.

I printed a very small edition of these on heavy paper so I can play around with hand-coloring some of them. I'll post the results of that when I finish.

Art-lovers interested in purchasing a Builderblocks print, click here. Artists interested in submitting your own work for the collection, click here. (Totemic17 also sells 7cm square wood blocks for $1. each on their Supplies page.)

Thanks to Jeff White (whose print Silverbacks I wrote about a few days ago) for bringing this opportunity to my attention. I always love collaboration with other printmakers, and carving these was lots of fun.

I'm At Sunny Point!

I am currently fulfilling a ten day artist residency at the Arts Center of Yates County Sunny Point. Sunny Point is a beautiful bit of land on Keuka Lake which includes a little white cottage, a large red barn studio, and a garage that is currently being converted into a ceramic studio. It was donated to the Art Center by the late Dr. Annie Smith (author of Bearing Up Cancer, among many other accomplishments) as a place for creativity and healing. Any artists interested in applying for residencies at Sunny Point click here.

So as you, dear readers, might imagine, I'm in a state of bliss. In the past I've enjoyed a number of writing and visual art retreats/residencies, and from 2004-2006 I spent two years immersed in a graduate studio. But this is the first time in seven years that I've had the opportunity to focus completely on my art-making in total peace and solitude for any concentrated period of time. Basically the first time since I had my lovely daughters (who I do miss terribly; they are coming to visit soon!) So I feel as if I am deeply savoring this residency more than any previously.

Even though I've been working in the studio like mad, I don't have anything quite finished enough to share yet. Probably tomorrow. I can say that I'm finally getting some real headway on my new book, The Nautilus and the Ammonite. Screen printing, linocuts, woodcuts, and watercolor painting are all involved, and things are going swimmingly.

Indiegogo Campaign Art Card #6: Ammonite

2.5" x 3.5" art card
Oil-based ink on cream-colored, 90" smooth paper
Open edition

This is the sixth of 8 original woodcut art cards being created during my Indiegogo fundraising campaign. These will be thank-you gifts for all funders who contribute $20 or more. Funders will get to choose their preferred design to receive.

Yesterday I posted card #5 depicting a nautilus shell. Today's print depicts the fossilized shell of an extinct ammonite. One of my upcoming book projects will be illustrating the poem The Nautilus and the Ammonite, anonymously written, in which two aquatic cousins form a friendship, travel and witness great sights together, until the ammonite is lost in the same mass extinction that ended the reign of dinosaurs. 

Writing about another ammonite fossil woodcut in October of last year, I outlined some of the reasons why I think these creatures have captured so much of my attention. 

Click here to view all the blog posts featuring my ammonite prints. 

Indiegogo Campaign Art Card #5: Nautilus

2.5" x 3.5" art card
Oil-based ink on cream-colored, 90" smooth paper
Open edition

This is the fifth of 8 original woodcut art cards being created during my Indiegogo fundraising campaign. These will be thank-you gifts for all funders who contribute $20 or more. Funders will get to choose their preferred design to receive.

As those who have been following this blog over the past year know, I've been particularly interested in ammonite fossils. The Nautilus is a close relative and also has a spiral shell. One of my upcoming book projects will be illustrating the poem The Nautilus and the Ammonite. 

"Ammonite (Abscission)"

White line woodcut (learn what that is here.)
24" x 24" (image), 30" x 34" (paper)
Watercolors on Stonehenge paper

This is my second, large, white-line ammonite woodcut. The first was posted about here.

This is another attempt at resurrection of the extinct through visual art. I wanted the colors to signify early autumn. There is movement and life, wet, breathing, and bulging as it grows. Green grasses bending under a breeze, scented with damp leaves and burnt wood. Before the grey hues of winter arrive, there is an explosion of color. Before we shut ourselves in to escape months of cold, may we dance naked around a bonfire. 

"Delicious autumn!  My very soul is wedded to it, and if I were a bird I would fly about the earth seeking the successive autumns." - George Eliot

"Ammonite (Kaleidoscopic)"

White line woodcut (learn what that is here.)
24" x 24" (image), 30" x 34" (paper)
Watercolors on Stonehenge paper

The block used for this print is a piece of pressure treated pine plywood I picked up at Home Depot. I chose it for the wonderfully bold pattern of grain, and did my drawing in response to it, and so I was thrilled when the grain appeared so boldly in the printing process. This beast took over two hours and a heck of a lot of paint to print just once, so it's a lot like painting.

I had been meaning to do a colorful white line woodcut of an ammonite fossil ever since I made a little 4" x 4" white line sketch of a colorful spiral back in September. I'm rather satisfied with these results, and look forward to doing another large white line woodcut on this type of block again soon.

Fossils are a source of endless fascination. And why wouldn't they be? They are traces of the past, embedded in stone. I can't get over the fact that these animals died out millions of years ago, yet I have the fossilized remains of one sitting on my desk and have seen countless more in museums and in photographs online.

A paleontologist carefully scrapes away rock to uncover impressions of the dead, while I carefully carve into a once-living tree to create an image inspired by that ancient past. The grain - the evidence of a tree's seasons - needed to be visible, embedded as saturated striations across the surface of this image. In this language I will write my love letters to the shadows of corpses. These stripes are lightening bolts I will harness to enliven its remains.

Even if only in a window on a page.

"Ammonite (Saxifrage)"

Collograph, paint, collage 
24" x 30"
Oil-based ink, acrylic paint, India ink, and yarn on Stonehenge paper
Artist's Proof

If I ever had a son, my husband and I were planning to name him "Saxifrage" after the character Saxifrage "Sax" Russel in Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars trilogy. Sax Russel is a physicist who leads the development of technologies used to terraform the planet Mars and make it habitable for humans. His character is pitted against the geologist Ann Clayborne, who seeks to preserve Mars's natural state. 

Saxifrage is also a plant that grows on rocks in cold climates. As it grows, it breaks the rocks apart, and the Latin word saxifraga means literally "stone-breaker", from Latin saxum ("rock" or "stone") + frangere ("to break"). 

"Ammonite (His Heart Unraveling)"

Collograph
24" x 30"
Oil-based ink on Stonehenge paper
Artist's Proof

As with my last collograph, this is dedicated to Kenneth Grahame. The text is taken from his beloved children's book The Wind in the Willows:

On either side of them, as they glided onwards, the rich meadow-grass seemed that morning of a freshness and a greenness unsurpassable. Never had they noticed the roses so vivid, the willow-herb so riotous, the meadow-sweet so odorous and pervading. Then the murmur of the approaching weir began to hold the air, and they felt a consciousness that they were nearing the end, whatever it might be, that surely awaited their expedition.

My aunt looked at this print and immediately the words reminded her of refrigerator magnets. I like that association very much. With these ammonite collographs I am grasping at scraps of materials common to my everyday experience - cardboard, bubble wrap, string - and then constructing an image of ancient creatures never seen alive by human eyes, incomplete and unearthed. With those magnets, we can never find all the words to say what we originally intended. We end up with fragmented statements, that in their incomplete state are more mysterious and poetic, and they seem to be ever more meaningful because we are forced to fill in the empty spaces. 

"Ammonite (Traveler's Return)"

Collograph
24" x 30"
Oil-based ink on Stonehenge paper
Artist's Proof

This is dedicated to Kenneth Grahame. The text is taken from his beloved children's book The Wind in the Willows:

Home! That was what they meant, those caressing appeals, those soft touches wafted through the air, those invisible little hands tugging all one way.

With this image, I started with the idea of juxtaposing an expressive depiction of an ammonite fossil with a sort of love letter to the long-deceased creature. But as I searched for the necessary words, my mind turned to a dramatic performance of Grahame's book I saw with my daughter a year ago. I think I intuitively connected this piece with that story because - as with many children's stories - all the animals in those stories are really people with animal traits being used symbolically. Also, the spiral is  such a simple arrangement that appears over and over again not only in nature, but in human creations, and has a universal appeal. Somehow I connected that with a work of literature that while written for children, is the product of a mature, adult mind, and expresses many sentiments universal to the human experience.

Here is home, and we have been gone for so long, it is exhilarating to see it again with what feel like new eyes, and yet also a strange and ethereal experience. It is not really the home we knew before, not just because it has changed, but because we have changed. In this life, we circle around over and over again, but with each roundabout, we are somehow both returning to a place we knew and arriving at a novel destination. It is a paradox of time.

"Hundertwasser 4" by Margaret Rankin

It has been way too long since I wrote about a print by the talented Margaret Rankin. (Last time was in 2010.) This image has been used with the artist's permission. Information about her and links to her online store, blog, Flickr, and Facebook pages can be found here.

I was especially drawn to this image because of my recent interest in ammonites, specifically ammonite fossil fields such as the one pictured below.

Photographs such as the one below feel like images of a mass burial, unearthed. Each fossilized shell is a spiral into infinity, unseen. Immortal, yet extinct; it is an eerie juxtaposition. In a small, strange way, I feel as if sacred ground has been desecrated, some secret, dark knowledge, revealed.

But in Rankin's print, I feel warmth and life. The spirals there tumble and roll, rise and sink, expand and contract. Though they are compartmentalized into rows, some break free, while others dig tunnels, build ladders, or otherwise expand their small place in the world. All seem to move and breath.

The title of her piece is after the Austrian artist Friedensreich Hundertwasser, known for his colorful paintings. As you can see from the example below, Haus im Wind (I), he also had an interest in spirals and bringing inanimate subjects alive with color and movement.