Come Rain or Shine

After a week off, we were ready to resume the latest round of woodcut classes.  I sent out reminders last night and had my car loaded with everything.  There was a threat of a rainstorm for about the time I'd be having to move all the supplies into the building (just like our first meeting two weeks ago), but other than about 2 minutes of afternoon sprinkles, it ended up being a very nice day.  We needed that, as another major storm had passed through the area yesterday, leading to another round of local flooding.

I was able to bring in all the class supplies with ease, but the storm had its effect on us.  The excessive rain over the past few days had caused some minor flooding inside the the Boatworks, leaving a few small puddles and a discolored floor that will eventually need repainting, but class would go on.

At the official start of class I only had one student, my most veteran woodcutter Mary, who had been busy with the new block that she had shared with last week's critique group.  She showed me a bunch of proofs she had pulled, and told me about her plans to finish it.  I made a few suggestions, including taking a rubbing off the block to help evaluate possibilities to change.  Later she would go back in and started making some of those changes.

About 15 minutes into our class period the other three students came through the door.  It seems that they had all been trapped on the north side of the Shark River inlet by raised drawbridges, a potential hazard this time of year.  I recommended going with route 35 next week and got them started.  Wynn (who had brought in one of the reductive prints he had been experimenting with on his own) had two blocks drawn and a good idea of how he wanted to proceed, so I showed him the tools we had to work with, gave him some basic instructions, and got him started.  Erin brought in a sketch on paper, but wanted a larger piece of wood to use for the print, so I cut her one and let her prepare it.  I had made a few suggestions regarding her sketch, which she considered as she reproduced her idea in reverse on her block.   Eventually I also gave her some basic tool lessons and she started cutting her block.  Brendan had rejected whatever paper sketch he had done since last time, but had an idea, and spent the whole time working out his idea on paper, then reproducing in in pencil on the wood.  He'll be ready to start cutting next week, and his block is small enough that he should still be ready to print by our last class meeting.