Yesterday a generous friend let me use her fabulous intaglio press. I spent the entire day inking monotypes and dancing to music in her perfect little studio. It was perfect timing too, for today a curator from the University had scheduled to come over to see some new work for a Fall show she is planning. I was glad I had some really new work to add to other things she wanted to view. The ink was still wet.

I have a series I started in ’07 called “Core Samples.” The idea that interested me behind this is what geologists do to test the hidden parts deep in the earth. They drill down a tube and grab up the layers of sediment, exactly as they have rested unnoticed for centuries. The layers are a record of time and passages, even the decaying of many organic things. The vertical pieces I have done recall this geological practice, but they are really landscapes in a sense. They are to me inner as well as outer landscapes. Landscapes I have come to understand are important work, or they can be. The Chinese have been doing sublime landscapes for centuries, and the best of them are not pretty pictures but worldview statements about the position of man in the grand scheme of wonder.

What I am posting today is one that I inked up yesterday. It is a direct response to what I wrote last time about the images that showed up in my pocket. I agree that the photo images I somehow gathered on my hike are better than this core sample representation. However the inked semblance reminds me of the gift of that day and is therefore a record of joy. I used an old racquetball of my husbands as a drawing tool to make the marks in this image. I hope you can dance with it too.