American Bible Story, More Praise

 

In addition to the Robert Blackburn Exhibition mentioned in the previous post, I am pleased to announce that Annie Bissett's recently completed, American Bible Story, has also been selected for inclusion in the International Print Center New York (IPCNY) New Prints|2009 exhibition, which will coincide with the IFPDA Print Fair in New York next month.  The 150 to 200 prints chosen for the IPCNY exhibit are selected from a group of over 2000 entries, so another big congratulations to Annie Bissett.

New Prints|2009 at the International Print Center New York (IPCNY) opens October 29 and remains on view through December 12, 2009.

International Print Center New York (IPCNY)

New Prints 2009/Autumn

11 am - 6 pm

526 W. 26th St,.Rm 824

New York, NY

(212) 989-5090

Website ipcny.org

American Bible Story and several of Annie Bissett's recent prints from her Pilgrim series are available at Cullom Gallery and through the Gallery's website.

AMERICAN BIBLE STORY

Japanese woodblock (moku hanga)
Paper size: 14.75" x 16" (37.5 x 40.6 cm)
Image size: 11.625" x 13.75" (29.5 x 34.9 cm)
5 shina plywood blocks
14 hand-rubbed impressions
Paper: Nishinouchi
Edition: 21 

 
An excerpt from Annie Bissett's blog, Woodblock Dreams.
I've been thinking for a long time about the way that present-day Americans of every political persuasion call upon "the founding fathers" to justify all sorts of theories about what America is and how Americans should behave. This quoting of early colonists has always reminded me of the practice of quoting the Bible to add legitimacy and authority to one's own ideas and feelings. Then, reading Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's narrative poem about John and Priscilla Alden, The Courtship of Miles Standish (1858), I noticed that Longfellow alluded to Bible love stories -- Ruth and Boaz, Rebecca and Isaac -- so I started to work with the idea that the early European settlers of America have become a kind of American Bible story.

The stories I included are pretty obvious -- Noah's ark, Adam and Eve, the pillar of clouds, the city on a hill. I also threw in a nod to Utamaro and his shunga prints. I had very much wanted the serpent to be saying "join or die" as it says in the original woodcut by Benjamin Franklin, but in my research I discovered that there's an artist named Justine Lai who is making extensive use of that phrase in her work. Lai is making a series of paintings that depict her having sex with each of the 44 presidents of the United States. I decided to omit the "join or die" text in my piece so as not to jump on that bandwagon.