Merry Christmas from Studio Arrabbiata

 

This has not been a great year as far as these things go.  I ended last year in a hospital, and at the beginning of this one, I went back to one.  Most of what I own is still in storage, including much of my completed art and art materials.  But I still have plans to be an artist, and am doing what I can to continue that idea.  For decades I had a tradition of making my own holiday cards, starting with a known work of art by a famous painter, changing aspects of it to be a more winter scene, or have a Christmas theme, cutting it as a small block, printing it, and coloring it to make sense to both the original and my new idea.  I often chose these works based on things I had seen recently, such as a museum show, or even something shown on a slide in class, or seen in a book.   

But some things have changed.  Last year I didn't do a card, having spent much of the late autumn and winter trapped in a hospital bed.  Though I have done a little printmaking this year, I had not planned to do a card this year, since I still have no watercolors, and my list of people who I send cards to has diminished, because people have stopped sending them as much.  However, I did have the materials to make a black and white card, and connection to the internet to find art examples, as long as I could remember who I wanted to look for.  

After checking out a variety of black and white art (mostly prints), I settled on the etchings of Edward Hopper, not his best known work, but something I have always enjoyed.  Another thing that has changed is that I don't have a camera at the moment, so I can't take a photo of this new card to post today.  As it turns out, I have made cards from Hopper works before, twice before in fact, and what you see above is one of those.  I will eventually get a camera, and get a photo of it posted to this site, but in the meantime, if you want to see the original work that inspired it, check out some Hopper etchings, and specifically a piece called East Side Interior, then substitute Santa Claus for the woman sitting at a sewing machine, gazing out a tenement window.  Translate that into a woodcut and ink wash piece, and you have the idea.