The conversation was held at 440 Gallery and moderated by multi-media artist Karen Gibbons karengibbonsart.com who is represented by 440 Gallery. The talk was attended by artist and curator Maddy Rosenberg “who maintains an active international curatorial as well as exhibition career ….[and] approaches curating as an extension of her art practice. In September 2009, Rosenberg opened CENTRAL BOOKING (centralbookingnyc.com), a multi-disciplinary art space focusing on artist’s books and exhibitions on art & science, in DUMBO, Brooklyn, representing over 150 artists “ (maddyrosenberg.net/biography). Artist and curator Hayley Ferber hayleyferber.com/press-1 and artist Jan Dicky jandickey.com/about and I participated in the talk.

Here an excerpt between Ms. Rosenberg and I:

Maddy Rosenberg: When I look at this, I thought it was an etching, and it was amazing the detail, and the light—and I’ve done collographs where the actual collograph looks a lot better than the print does–so, the fact is that you could get that kind of feel from the printing of it, and that you can understand that you could get that from looking at that, these different textures, because it is very different from even visually the surfaces look very different when their printed, so it is even more amazing to me that was a collograph.

Collograph: Edition Variable
Image: 19.6” x 28.6”
Paper: 19.6” x 28.6”
© Carol Morrison
Printed by Kathy Caraccio Printmaking Studio

Carol Morrison: Well, I am really complemented….when this came off the press there was moments that I was really surprised. I had a sense of what was coming, but then there are these other kind of magical things that happen, I was not only using new materials,.…for instance, I was ironing found plastics like a crazy scientist in my small studio space. I had never used some of these materials, so I wasn’t quite sure how it would all work. But I knew I could very patiently work [through the process]—I took it kind of step by step using forms that also have a relationship to each other. So, I didn’t just use squares of any size, they repeat themselves so there is a way images [and forms] are then organizing in your mind, they’re recognizable [shapes].

And, I am also working with an amazing master printmaker, Kathy Caraccio who knows how to ink a plate, how to wipe a plate –so…. the first two prints that were pulled were too dense. This [print you see here] was the third pull off the press, so we were learning the plate as we were wiping and printing the plate. We learned we had to wipe it down more.

This learning of [composition] was also a process, because my work 20 years ago was much smaller (9” x12”) –whereas this is 20” x 30” so that I became more confident as to how I delineate space and my composition. I really keep moving the plate, so that it can work sideways and upside down.

Maddy Rosenberg: And the edges too, and the delineation of the shapes through the edge.

Carol Morrison: Yes, and the edge is where you are going to pick up more ink…when you think about the edge, you can feel the plate and that is where the ink is going to collect. Certain things [and techniques about printmaking] I learned along the way, and I don’t think about it now, it just happens, and then there are all these magical surprises. The other two prints that came before this one, are just part of the process.

Maddy Rosenberg: That is what is great about printmaking. I was trained as a lithographer, and once I wiped the plate with too much water, and I ran it through, and I had this beautiful monoprint that was basically looking at the world through this haze of rain. So, it wasn’t the traditional way of doing things, but you get these kinds of surprises.

Carol Morrison: And then we ran this is a second time and we got this ghost. A light blue that looks like a New York aerial shot in the show. It doesn’t have the nuance [that this print has] but now, I am working on going even larger, because I feel I could use more space. And if I think about my new direction it would be to give myself more space.

Maddy Rosenberg: And I would like to see that, because it feels like more of an embossed print, the subtlety of it, but still working with the same imagery.