SOLARPLATE WORKSHOP REVIEW

Marlys Kubicek, Dan Welden, Sarah Kreihn

END OF WORKSHOP DECOMPRESSION
Today was the last day of a 2 and 3 day/or 5 day solarplate workshop with Dan Welden. It was held at the Armstrong-Prior studio, organized by John Armstrong, Joan Prior and Marlys Kubicek. I was a volunteer studio assistant and travel arranger. The happy participants were blessed with small class size (7) and lots of personal attention. Dan was blessed with some very talented and fun artists who really took his instruction to heart and ran with it.


The work was amazing. Many of the participants focused on creating relief plates by working directly on the plates and then trying all kinds of different ways to print them, varying the color, orientation and number of pulls. Some used stencils, chine colle and of course transparencies to work their magic. There were some pretty happy smiles as the prints were revealed. The solarplate process is fairly easy to learn. But it can be as difficult and challenging as the most complex printmaking process in the variety of methodology and the desire of the artist to reach a defined result. Even Dan, who knows more about solarplates than any other person could, was frustrated after several failed attempts to achieve his desired result. But in this class, no one gave up. Those who encountered failures, quietly kept plugging away until they found a way. This is the environment Dan Welden brings to his workshops. A safe place to fail. Allowing the artist to learn even more from the failures than the successes. Plus you can't find a nicer man on the planet than Dan.

So here is the latest class portrait in his long list of worldwide workshops:
L to R: Wendy Willis, Janet Towbin, Marlys Kubicek, Diana Hartley, Libby Kalinowski, John Armstrong, Joan Prior, Dan Welden; in front: Susan Marquez, Sheri Compton and Sandi Long. Not pictured: Sarah Kreihn, Paulette Redmond, Audrey Van Kirk and Glory Tacheenie-Campoy.