Recently I spent a week in Omaha at The Union for Contemporary Art and printed in their shop that my good friend, Joshua Norton, constructed and supervises. While I’ve had 1000’s of my screen prints produced by Monolith Press and others over my career, it’s been about 10 years since I’ve been involved in the actual printing process. It was a good opportunity for me to experiment and learn from hand-pulling the prints, making the screens and mixing inks, but it took me a few days to get the hang of it again. Special thanks goes out to Joshua and The Union for being such gracious hosts – I suggest you check out their work too.

I set out to make two editions, but as it turned out I ended up spending most all of my time dinking around with my first print, a 10 color screen print entitled “Five Birds”. There is a total of only 33 signed and numbered Five Birds prints in the final editions(20 Green, 9 White & 4 Pink). Each print is slightly unique and imperfect. About one third of these Five Birds prints will be offered up in a purchasing lottery this Wednesday (A new lottery post with directions will be posted)…..the rest will slowly pop up in galleries, lotteries and auctions. They will be pricier than my typical screen prints due to their extremely limited quantities.

With the time we had remaining at the print shop, after I finally finished the Five Birds prints, Joshua took the helm to help us kick out a diverse edition of “Dripples”, from a drawing I had in my sketchbook. The printing process for these was quite loose with mixing colors and consistency, a late night jam accompanied by this guy. We’ve given each Dripples print a little extra love with pencils and markers making them all unique. A portion of these prints will be included in Wednesday’s purchasing lottery.

I was inspired by the process of creating these screen prints on the fly at the Union, and I hope to be able to focus some attention on another hand pulled edition soon – I’ll make more next time! I would like make a note to interested customers that the prints that came out of my time at the Union all have imperfections of some kind, like tiny ink splotches or dinged corners, that came about in the handling of the prints and working through the processes. I’m proud of the prints we hand pulled in Omaha, but they do have a very different quality than my screen prints from Monolith Press.

After we get some of these Union screen prints out to randomly selected customers, we have plans to release many larger editions in the next few months. There’s a new 12″ x 12″ art print we just picked up from Monolith, another very long art print taken from a poster, a few mini prints that got bumped up into full sized editions and there’s a new variety of shirts from a classic design coming soon as well. Oh, then there’s those Widespread Vegas posters some of you have been asking about, we’ll get to them eventually too. One thing at a time…stop by on Wednesdays to see what’s new. There will be an email announcement for some of the new releases and the Panic poster sale.

Thanks for your support…much to come.

 

 

50 thoughts on ““Five Birds” & “Dripples” screen prints hand pulled at the Union for Comtemporary Art in Omaha

  1. Corey Shade

    Awesome news all around. Especially interested in this “very long art print taken from a poster” if that’s what I hope it is, I’ll be a very happy fella.

    Reply
  2. Haney

    I really love the new stuff! I’m sure it was fun to do something different for a bit – Here’s hoping those 5 birds move down south!

    🙂

    Reply
  3. Kimberly Squires

    LOVE both of these!! I know it was awesome to get your hands dirty again in the production process of your work. I love working with my hands, graphic designer turned massage therapist. Screen printing was one of my faves. Super excited for a chance at these two tomorrow and for what’s to come! Thanks for adding some sunshine to my days!

    Reply
  4. Hightime

    “vitality shows not only in the ability to persist but in the ability to start over.” – F. Scott Fitzgerald

    Reply
  5. Anthony

    I love both prints. It’ll be a hard decision which one to ask for in the lottery tomorrow. As always, incredible pieces Marq.

    Reply
  6. Danielle

    Both are so awesome in so many ways! And how exciting for you to be pulling screens again!

    Been Dripples dreamin alllll day…

    There once was a feller named Dripples
    His face was all melty with ripples
    But his third eye was a grinning
    The addicts heads were all spinning
    In hopes this lottery they’d be winning

    …is it Wednesday yet… 🙂

    Reply
  7. chris

    One of the first things I ever got from you was a 7 birds gold handbill. I still have it and it’s still my favorite.
    Love your birds Marq!

    Reply
  8. C. Daniels

    Great work Marq!!! I’m already crossings my fingers on tomorrow’s lottery. I can’t wait to hopefully add this beauty to my walls.

    Reply
  9. Barbara Kielbania

    Wow, This just warms my heart. The spring color, everything. Fingers crossed for a drop. Thank you for such amazing Work. Happy Earth Day.. Peace

    Reply
  10. Trina G

    Sooooo beautiful!!! Fitting for Earth Day! And I love birds. Collect Spusta. And from NE. Thinking I need this!!!!!

    Reply
  11. Corey

    Just popping back in here to say that I don’t think I’ve ever been quite as smitten with a print as the 5 Birds. Slowly since the day the pictures were first posted it has crept into every corner of my mind. Such a wonderful little piece. I hope there is a plan for some variation of the original prints in the future. 5″ x 7″ ‘s or something similar would be great!

    Reply

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