Prints Archives - Iskra Fine Art

Introducing the Heavy Metal Hydrant Suite: Limited Edition Industrial Prints from Iskra

September 18, 2018 by Iskra Leave a Comment

My hydrant iskra collection — Meet Iowa No.4, My personal Fire hydrant

It is time to come clean about fire hydrants: I love them. In a world teetering between fire and flood, with catastrophe pending on every front, I do love a piece of heavy metal I cannot lift. I have my own brilliant yellow hydrant in front of my house, and it makes me happy every time I come home and see it there, surrounded by equally yellow dandelions. I feel safe. Put together with flawless arrangements of bolts and screwplates and circles and cones and handed down through hundreds of years from men with rough hands and wrenches, the hydrant is unarguably TRUE. Hydrants are valiant, like German Shepherds, and they have no existential doubts, although I do think they are vain. It’s a quiet form of dandyism, but think they enjoy the ornaments essential to their functioning – the lovely multicolored chains and hats and bits of metal that festoon from arm to arm.

Now, ulp, I have one inside my house. How do you say no in the middle of a birthday party when someone says We Have A Present for You, it’s on a truck, how about this corner? Well, you say yes! It’s the Autumnal blazing happiness yellow of sunflowers and pear apples and drowsy honeybees. It’s pettable, and clean, and it comes with its own little tag indicating that it is #4. Its presence in my house makes me realize the Heavy Metal Hydrant Suite can’t wait any longer to meet the world.

I have been working on this series of prints for quite awhile. I have approximately 600 photographs of fire hydrants in my files, dating back several decades. This is nothing in terms of commitment compared to the obsessive depth of The Hydrant Museum curated by Fire Hydrant.org. This site, the brainchild of Thomas Ingalsbe, is astonishing. Here you will find archived private collections of fire hydrants, restoration tips, and descriptions of every hydrant imaginable. Behind the scenes, at an undisclosed location behind a berm in a state starting with an A, Mr. Ingalsbe has his own collection of 900 fire hydrants. His website has been a true inspiration, and I am grateful for the kind assistance he has offered with documentation and certain mysteries of manufacture.

This series of prints is ongoing, and will be released on my shop over the next few months, starting with this initial set of three. These prints are ideal gifts for the person in your life who stays up ’til three worrying about catastrophe. Also, your local fireman, whether they have saved your cat from a tree or rescued your house from an inferno, or even if you just have a crush on him/her. Start with an offering of art and work up to apple pie, I guarantee you will get their attention. . . . This series is printed in archival inks on fine rag paper in editions of 75, and affordably priced at $175 including shipping. The image size is 12 to 13.5 x 18 inches on a 17 x 22 sheet. Each piece is composed from my own photography, digitally blended with paint and inspired by the music of the street. Click on the titles below or go to the Hydrant Section of my shop to review details or to purchase.

Rensselaer L-90 in Green Iskra Print — Rensselaer L-90 in Green

Mueller Five and a quarter Hydrant Print by Iskra — Mueller Five and a Quarter on a Blue Sky Day

Mueller In Chaos Fire Hydrant — Mueller in Chaos (Equanimity)

In other news please save the date for Digital Maneuvers, a group show including me, Troy Gua, Kate Sweeney and Stephen Rock at Seattle Art Museum Gallery, opening First Thursday October 4, 6-7:30.

My solo show, ColorBath, at SAM’s Taste Restaurant continues through November 5. Open Weds-Sun 11-5 and Thursdays 11-9.

Save the Date for Colorbath! Iskra at Taste | SAM

July 9, 2018 by Iskra Leave a Comment

The Harbor Iskra at Taste Restuarant at SAM — “Harbor Morning,” mixed media archival pigment print, 36 x 36″ © Iskra Johnson

Summer, finally! I’ve been immersed for months in new ways of looking at color and light, and finally what I have been seeing in my minds’ eye has unfurled in front of me. What turns a mere boat into a “vessel” is the fleeting moment of refraction. In my spring wanderings through freezing shipyards that light was not always easy to find. Often I would return home from Salmon Bay and Harbor Island with hundreds of classic northwest gray-green photographs, all cast in the steely gaze of cloudcover. Occasionally a well-honed wind would scrape the sky, leaving blue shards on the water and astonishing bits of gold. One evening iridescent swallows flew through from the bridge. Two raptors shrieked courtship from the highest masts, offering what seemed like a lovers’ benediction.

The Golden Rope Photography by Iskra The Wrapped Ship photograph by Iskra Composition with Sail maritime photograph by Iskra

Journal Entry: The shipyard on Sunday. Men playing guitars on derelict balconies, men riding yellow bikes, men rising shirtless and surprised from the hulls of tugboats unshaven and lurching but still afloat. The wooden planks, the seams of trees that run out into the waves parallel, almost indistinguishable. Then the five alarm fire of a red buoy hanging off the Maudie Mae and its shadow and the starburst within the shadow.

Inspiration photos from Salmon Bay.

As a photo-based printmaker I start with the camera. The photograph is the diving platform. From that reality-based ledge I go into a world of improvisation, working with layers of paint to create a completely new world. Colorbath goes farther into abstraction and paint than I have gone before, and opens up exciting new directions for the future.

Please mark your calendar for Thursday August 9th and join me for a reception for Colorbath, from 6-7:30 at Taste Restaurant, Seattle Art Museum, 1300 First Ave, Seattle, WA 98101. I will have nine new large works ranging in size from 30 x 30″ to 30 x 40″. They will be posted for preview on the SAM Gallery site and in my portfolios soon.

Blue Buoys detail Iskra at Taste “Blue Buoys” (section), © Iskra Johnson

Postscript:

I was a lake swimmer for years. I fell in love with my first tugboat when I was 17 and stayed up 24 hours listening to Keith Jarrett’s Köln Concert while looking at rust and tires on the Duwamish. Some of the people who actually spend their lives working on boats feel the same way. If you have an hour or two to get lost at sea visit these folks at Maritime Family. All I can say is WOW.

Colorbath! A Glimpse of New Work

May 31, 2018 by Iskra 2 Comments

The Blue Sky Print by Iskra — The Salish © Iskra Johnson, Archival Pigment Print

I have been thinking a lot lately about near and far. In memory and in walking, as in contemporary painting, they are often the same place.

My newest series, “Color Bath,” investigates the ambiguity of sky and shore. I’m asking myself what happens when you let go of preconceptions, lift anchor, and go into the space between. It can be uneasy. The docks are rarely steady. In the shifting horizontals of wave-line and tether even the tide markers may lie.

Water Study3 by Iskra — Numbers lost in water make their own rhyme. Work in progress.

These new pieces are large, up to 30 x 40″. They blend watercolor and photography and are becoming more and more painterly as they evolve. Sometimes they come with stories, which you can find along with work in progress on my Instagram. The show opens at Taste, at Seattle Art Museum in August, more details soon.

Thank you so much to everyone who came to Vashon Island for the VIVA Artist Studio Tour! It was a great success. I had wonderful conversations with new friends and old, and was happy to find homes for many of my favorite pieces. A special thanks to Cathy Sarkowsky for hosting, and to the inspired community of Vashon Island for keeping the magic alive.

Iskra Spring Shows 2018

March 20, 2018 by Iskra 2 Comments

“The Spool,” archival pigment print, 22×30 and 14×20

A big thank you to everyone who came out to the opening of Industrial Pastorale at Perry and Carlson! It was a wonderful gathering of friends and family from throughout the Salish Sound. I had long conversations with many new art appreciators, some of whom I knew only by Instagram avatar. It is a lovely surprise to see the internet unfold into real life. A big thank you too to those who went home with various prints like the one above, from the Wild Color series inspired by the Anacortes Shipyard. Most of the work is collected now in a print gallery on my site, so if you cannot make it to Mt. Vernon take a look here. The show continues through April 1, Hours: Wed-Sat 11-6, Sun 12-4 and by appointment. 504 S. First Street, Mt. Vernon, WA.

To recuperate I went to the studio the next morning and cleaned out my sink. A long pause that was. Lots of scrubbing. Absolutely nothing will get stains out of a cheap plastic utility tub. I could really drag this task out. Baking soda, bleach, five kinds of scrubbies, soya solvent, the Gypsy Kings. Very helpful, I recommend doing this at least once a year.

It is going to be a very busy spring, with four shows between now and the middle of May. I hope you can stop by whatever fits your mood. Each event is an entirely different kind of scene, and I am excited to broaden my world to new communities in the Seattle and East Side.

Ryan James Fine Arts 3rd Biennial Exhibition with 50 Selected Artists

Opening April 12 5-10 PM

11905 124th Ave. NE, Kirkland 98034

Show runs from April 1 – May 31st

* * *

Layered, Presented by the Sammamish Arts Commission

Sammamish City Hall Commons Gallery

April 23 – July 20, 2018

Artist Reception Thursday, May 24th from 6-8:00 pm

* * *

Seattle Artist League at Galvanize 1 Night Only!

April 5th 5-8 PM

111 S. Jackson

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Vashon Studio Tour (Now called VIVA)

First Two Weeks of May, details to come

Although I have loved being in the landlocked meadowscapes of the Skagit Valley, my work for the summer show at Taste will return to the water. Think the light in August, think of that pink haze of condensed heat and rose petals, how the sun shines diffuse like thistle fluff and in the distance the sound of the ships turns the clouds blue in the bay. There may be some pink, some yellow too, definitely some very hot color. Here is a glimpse.

Tethered waterscape print by Iskra — Tethered 1, © Iskra Johnson

The Brighter Day: Happy New Year from Iskra Fine Art

January 10, 2018 by Iskra Leave a Comment

“Parallels are not what we think. They do not really exist except in a mathematical sense and except as an idea to play off. If it is difficult for anything in the real world to move in a true straight line, think of the impossibility of two things moving together in two parallel straight lines.

In the human imagination a parallel world is not a world that replicates the one in which we live or that is its exact opposite but one that turns and flows through many other possibilities and dimensionalities; all the while keeping company and somehow referencing the one it shadows.”—From Consolations, by David Whyte

Welcome to the new year! I am looking forward to light on the horizon in 2018. As I look back on 2017, it was not without its provocations, but in spite of geologic, political and human disasters my work kept going and expanding in new and unexpected ways. When I first began trying to find my own voice after decades in design it often felt like something too hard to do. It was easier to drink a third cup of coffee and stare into space than actually attempt to make the vision in my mind’s eye. Now I am happy to say I find it impossible to stop working. Of course there are always things I would prefer to avoid, (oh, god. varnishing!) (gluing paper!) (archiving prints), but the strategy of always doing something else that I don’t want to do less while avoiding the Big Things seems to pay off, as eventually there is nothing left to do but the bigger thing, and that ends up becoming a show. Speaking of which:

Save the date for

Industrial Pastorale

A solo show of imagery exploring the liminal edge between rural and urban landscape

at Perry & Carlson in Mt. Vernon, Washington

Opening: Saturday March 3rd 3-6

(timed so you can catch the shows in sister art mecca Edison too!)

I am working in the studio every day to complete this new series of work after which I will catch my breath for a second and then begin developing ideas for “The Harbor” my solo show at Taste at SAM in August. In between studio marathons I am back to reading poetry books and essays, and diving deep into the connection between words and images, story and composition. Thank you for David Whyte, Ali Smith and Annie Dillard, who are my newest bedtime companions. I could happily dream with those three for the next year, with maybe Virginia Woolf and Charles Dickens thrown in for good measure:

“There is a kind of sleep that steals upon us sometimes, which, while it holds the body prisoner, does not free the mind from a sense of things about it, and enable it to ramble at its pleasure. So far as an overpowering heaviness, a prostration of strength, and an utter inability to control our thoughts or power of motion, can be called sleep, this is it; and yet we have a consciousness of all that is going on about us; and if we dream at such a time, words which are really spoken, or sounds which really exist at the moment, accommodate themselves with surprising readiness to our visions, until reality and imagination become so strangely blended that it is afterwards almost a matter of impossibilty to separate the two. —From Oliver Twist

That place. Where this came from:

Liminal Shift (Division Street), limited edition archival pigment print, available here.

Thanks for reading, and have patience while I try to finish my long-promised next article, Instagram for Artists. Lots of research. Lots of coffee, Please sir, I want some more. . . .

Introducing the Heavy Metal Hydrant Suite: Limited Edition Industrial Prints from Iskra

Save the Date for Colorbath! Iskra at Taste | SAM

Colorbath! A Glimpse of New Work

Iskra Spring Shows 2018

The Brighter Day: Happy New Year from Iskra Fine Art

Industrial Pastorale

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