I create to inspire people to look more closely at the world around them, and to find fascination in the beauty and intricacy that’s so easy to ignore yet so vital. I prize technical finesse, channeled into drawing, printmaking, mixed media, and other artistic channels. Making art helps me slow down and truly see things, from the vastness of landscape to the minuteness on the ground at my feet. Art and design can’t make a real creature, building, or even a real leaf, so my work grasps their imprints—their images, their forms, and their movements. Process is as important to me as the finished product, and the labor and time my work requires makes my subjects more meaningful to me. Each subject has some unreachable grandeur or mystery that I grasp for with detailed portrayals. Whether I’m watching for the right moment to take a reference photo, remembering mixing a color to match the reflections on Susquehanna, or picking up my thousandth crimson maple leaf on a walk, translating something into art grants fresh eyes for the things I render. 

Printmaking is an endlessly fascinating process to me. The way I work is to handle each print differently, although the plate may be the same or similar. There are nuances revealed each time the prints emerge on the press and later when they are dry. The prints inform each other and me as an artist. The paper, for instance, is an important part of the work, in the way it receives the imagery and in the final way the print appears. Printmaking can encompass drawing, painting, collage in an infinite variety of ways. There are exciting discoveries and accidents. The latter offer a different perspective that leads to further exploration and invention.

I have been involved in the arts my whole life, but then again, we all have been. To quote Picasso, “Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once we grow up.” I am not a child anymore so I have to remind myself that the work will create itself, just like it did when I was a child.  Whatever my abilities are, they are enough to get the job done. The biggest problem is trusting myself. To learn to follow, not lead. The work itself has a life of its own. I must learn to listen and see which direction it needs me to go. My most successful work has always a surprise to me.

Julissa is a young woman who has been attending, learning, and producing work at Equinox press for more than four years. Julissa has Cerebral Palsy and finds Equinox press to be a positive atmosphere for her to continue her art and education. Julissa has only improved while working at the studio. Her work mostly consists of landscapes, images inspired by her nephew, and her love of baseball. Julissa has recently started been creating art that represents nature. She hopes to continue creating and learning while working at Equinox press.

There are worlds to be found in the arrangement of objects. Contrasts and similarities, gestures and memories come together to create stories.  Stones, or rocks,  are considered inanimate, somewhat immovable, solid yet  when considered separately they morph into individual characters playing a role in a story. 

My recent work pushes  these stones to become actors.   Interestingly, as  these prints are rotated, new conversations appear on their own.  As an artist my work continues to explore my observations of human interactions.

I work in primarily in clay and step with wonder into printmaking.  Using rocks as a character in my artistic  work is fulfilling;  my background is in geology!  

Paige is a wife, mother, and illustrator who has been producing work at Equinox press for the past four years. She started attending work shops with her twin sister Julissa and has enjoyed printmaking ever since. Paige has a fine art background and previously considered herself a sculptor. At Equinox Press her eyes were opened to the wonderful world of printmaking. Paige plans on continuing her printing, she has
previously created Monotypes and Solarplate prints. Her most recent body of work depicts the joys and chaos of motherhood in a whimsical way. 

I have long recognized the limitations of convention and tradition. Seeking safe acceptability is an impediment to artistic creativity and progress. I’ve also learned that fighting them is a waste of precious artistic energy, and so I have chosen to side step them and explore printmaking. 

Through the use of the materials and my attraction to the surfaces I see in front of me as I work, I form a window of sight for myself into a variety of experience both past and present. My subject matter at this point is rooted in very simple and everyday things; the birds and squirrels in my backyard and images of my husband who has been a faithful sitter for many years. The pen and ink drawings tend to evolve into a more elaborate presentation of an outer shape to the inner states of my life. The prints however, are rather more focused on mark making and exploring what the metal and I can make as I try not to superimpose a thing but try to “draw out” of the surface what it is able to “give up”. It is a bit of a confrontational way of working as it is a moment of facing just myself, the metal, and the diamond point that I use to scratch the marks. In this small group of images, the squirrels and the birds and my dear friend’s face give me the reason to make the attempt.
I was schooled as a painter, draftsman and printmaker in the State University of New York system. I have shown my work in New York, Pennsylvania and Maryland. I have held Adjunct and Visiting Artist positions in Binghamton NY, Lock Haven PA and Wilkes-Barre PA . I employed myself in my studio in Baltimore MD for 23 years but currently, live and maintain a studio in Johnson City NY.