Photo courtesy of Max Valentine
Master printmaker Max Valentine (Art ’15) returns to Chico State as Personal to Political opens at the Janet Turner Print Museum. Featuring works by 17 contemporary African American artists, the exhibition celebrates their voices and perspectives while showcasing the collaboration at the heart of printmaking.
Before Max Valentine (Art ’15) discovered printmaking, he mostly knew art as a solitary practice. Drawing had always been a creative outlet for him, but when he stepped into the printmaking studio as a first-year student in the art program, he found a creative community that shifted his perspective.
“I remember being like, ‘I want to be in this room,’” Valentine said. “I knew about printmaking—my dad is a commercial printer, so I grew up around a shop with ink and presses—but this was something entirely different.”
As he spent more time drawing and exploring the hallways of the art department, Valentine noticed one of the studios stayed particularly active at night. Intrigued by a community of printmakers he saw working late into the evening, he enrolled in his first printmaking class the following semester with the encouragement of Professor Eileen Macdonald.
“After the first print I pulled, I never looked back,” said Valentine. “Printmaking allowed me to draw, but it itched something else. Every print and every process felt like a problem that needed solving.”
Now, as a master printmaker at Berkeley’s Paulson Fontaine Press, connecting with contemporary artists to transform paintings, sculptures, quilts, and other works into fine art prints has become a routine and cherished practice.
“I try to give every artist an avenue that best relates to the work they want to accomplish, and I get to be the technician that facilitates the process that achieves those results,” said Valentine, “I continue to make both prints and drawings, but I always create through the lens of a printmaker.”
As the fall semester begins, the relationship between printmaker and artist goes on display with Personal to Political: Celebrating the African American Artists of Paulson Fontaine Press, making its final stop at Chico State’s Janet Turner Print Museum August 25 through October 17.
Featuring works by 17 contemporary African American artists, the exhibit highlights how creative partnerships between artists and printmakers can bring history to life on a single page.
Janet Turner Print Museum staff do a walk through of Personal to Political exhibition. (Matt Bates/University Photographer)
“The best part of the job is having artists in the studio, trying to figure out how they like to work and how they like to make marks,” Valentine said. “It’s our job to guide them into what we think process-wise would best execute the mark that correlates to what they create outside of the studio.”
For Rachel Skokowski, director of galleries and curator of the Janet Turner Print Museum, that cooperative mindset is what sets Paulson Fontaine Press apart.
“There are so many hands behind the one print that you see in a frame on a wall,” Skokowski said. “I think people don’t always realize that.”
Led by Pam Paulson and Rhea Fontaine, the women-founded Berkeley studio has spent nearly three decades collaborating with contemporary artists to produce these limited-edition intaglio prints, with a specific focus on amplifying African American voices.
Among the exhibition highlights are prints created with multiple generations of Gee’s Bend quilters, African American women from a small Alabama community artistically acclaimed for transforming scraps and repurposed materials into quilts with bold patterns and designs.
Louisiana Bendolph, American Housetop (For the Arnett’s), 2005, color soft ground etching with
aquatint and spit bite aquatint, 45.5 x 38 in., courtesy of Paulson Fontaine Press.
Through the use of a soft-ground etching technique, printmakers at Paulson Fontaine have created a method of capturing the texture of the fabric directly onto copper plates.
“So much work and labor and collaboration went into every single one of these pieces,” Skokowski said. “It’s really incredible, the result they’re able to achieve through printmaking.”
During the exhibition, Valentine’s journey comes full circle as he returns to campus to lead a printmaking demonstration for students.
Skokowski hopes his visit, along with the exhibition itself, helps students recognize the many career paths within the arts.
“For many students [pursuing art degrees], they think, ‘Oh, I have to be an artist,’” she said. “But actually, you could be somebody who’s working with artists every day and helping them create incredible work together.”
Personal to Political: Celebrating the African American Artists of Paulson Fontaine Press was organized by Bedford Gallery at the Lesher Center for the Arts, Walnut Creek, California, and will be on view August 25 through October 17 at the Janet Turner Print Museum.
Pam Paulson and Rhea Fontaine will present a public lecture at 5:30 p.m. September 3 in the Recital Hall (Arts 150), followed by a reception in the galleries. On October 15 from 4 to 7 p.m. the museum will host “Print, Paste, Create!” a community art-making event inspired by the exhibition.
