top of page

Eugene Printmakers Community Studio is a 501(c)3 non profit arts organization that furthers the knowledge, practice and understanding of printmaking and book arts. We host workshops, classes and other events to educate and inspire our community. In the near future, we hope to provide affordable studio access for printmakers, letterpress printers and book artists including a working environment that emphasizes safe, sustainable and non-toxic practices.

 

You can visit us during every First Friday Artwalk at our underground studio located at:

ArtCity

160 E. Broadway

Eugene, OR 97401

Below J.Michael's Bookstore.

However, we love the idea of pop-up printmaking — we hold events, classes and workshops at various venues around town including breweries, parks, and schools.

 

For more information contact us here.

or write info@eugeneprintmakers.org

Join our mailing list

Never miss an update

7.1.2020 - 12.31.2020

“Snippets of Eugene"

A Contemporary Art Installation/Performance 

by Eugene Printmakers 

July to December, 2020

BRIDGE Exhibitions of Contemporary Art, Covid-19 Pivot: 

Reflections Space Eugene Exhibitions 

What:  Printing/taking rubbings off of manhole covers and grates and other patterns and textures located on Eugene’s city streets, sidewalks and walls. Our prints will be on paper and fabric.

 

Who: Eugene Printmakers! We will be dressed in workers' coveralls and carry our printing supplies in buckets. (We will conform to all of the health and safety guidelines   related to Covid-19.) We'll invite the public to printing locations that we announce on social media. Everyone is invited to watch our demonstrations as well as participate in printing and take home a print. We will also involve the public by asking for suggestions of interesting patterns in our dear city. We will identify various patterns to print ahead of time and will post a calendar of event dates and locations. 

 

 “Snippets of Eugene” will become mementos of places in our beloved city that the residents of Eugene will be able to take home with them. They will also be invited to experience printing patterns of their own choosing. Our concept is to call attention to the textures and patterns that we live with and often overlook in our everyday lives, and call attention to them as beautiful and compelling prints. The Eugene public will be able to go home with patterns from their favorite places, places that contain memories of events that punctuate their lives. 


 

When and Where: We will print multiple times between July 1 and December 31. 

We are planning to do two sessions during Visual Arts week in downtown (most likely on Broadway and Saturday Market. We'll be mindful not to block the traffic and be safe.) After that, we'll print in different neighborhood all over Eugene at least once a month. We'll announce our session on our social media and plan to live-feed our printing via Instagram, so anyone can watch us print from anywhere. We'll ask the public to point us to interesting manhole covers, street textures, grates or vent covers in their neighborhoods.

 

It's confirmed that we will display the prints on paper in the LCC Downtown campus!  Throughout the course of the project, we will add to our installation in the storefront window to engage the public and for the public to follow the progress of “Snippets of Eugene.” The installation of prints will have a cumulative effect, as memories of beloved places accumulate in our memories as time goes on. 

 

We will create an online/virtual exhibition that we will post on social media and on our Eugene Printmakers website.

 

The public will have a chance to purchase “Snippets of Eugene” in the form of printed =T-shirts and bandanas, at each printing performance. The proceeds will be split among Eugene Printmakers, The ArtCity (who has been generously hosting our studio space) and one more local charity. 

We will also raffle off some printed merchandise from each printing event via an Instagram live-feed of the drawing! The purpose of sales and raffles will be to generate interest and excitement for the project and bring more participants to each event. 


 

How: We use non-toxic, dye-based fabric ink to print street patterns on paper, t-shirts, aprons, patches. (We'll make sure to clean up after ourselves, of course. We are good at that.)

$700 and the proceeds from sale will be used for the materials: (ink, rollers, paper, t-shirts, aprons, our worker’s uniforms, cleaning supplies etc.) for this project.


 

Why: It's a chance to pay close attention to where we call home. We'll use multiple media outlets to reach out to community members. This is a super FUN, interactive project within our community that will delight the public and lift spirits. It's guaranteed to satisfy a craving for creative, engaging and social activities during this crazy quarantine.

PAST EVENTS (Selected)

• ArtCity's Studio Without Walls, West Park block, downtown Eugene, 

    2017, 2018, 2019

 

• Fiesta Cultural presented by Lane Arts Council, Kesey Square, downtown 

   Eugene, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019

 

• Beats & Brushstrokes, ELAN (Emerging Leaders in the Arts) Sam Bond's    

    Brewing East, 2017, 2018, 2019

 

• Pints & Prints, Claim 52 Brewing, 2016, 2017, 2018

 

• Adventure Children's Museum Valentine To-Do, Valley River Center, 2018

 

• Wood Engravers' Network Annual Conference, Horse Creek Lodge, 

   McKenzie Bridge, Oregon, 2018

02.22.18
Letterpress love at children's museum

Eugene Printmakers recently joined Adventure! Children's Museum for their Valentines To-Do. The museum, located on the second floor at Valley River Center, invited us to bring our presses and give kids the opportunity to print unique valentine cards. We set up two antique letterpresses, one with hand-set type and one with a lovely heart image. Kids could print the heart on the front of their card then take it to the next press to print the text on the inside. Parents got involved too, and everyone seemed to really enjoy the chance to try their hand at this centuries old method of printing. The museum asked us to come back in the near future, so watch our Facebook page to find out when we'll be there again.

A look back at 2017

Basking in the glow of another successful Pints & Prints fundraiser at the end of 2016, we started the new year energized and excited to continue our mission of bringing printmaking to the masses. Here are a few highlights from 2017.

 

Earth Day (April 22) found us back at Beats & Brushstrokes, a fundraiser for Emerging Leaders in the Arts (ELAN). The event embraced the Earth Day theme, and several of our members carved woodblocks with environmental imagery. We printed these along with others from our eclectic collection of blocks for those who came out to support ELAN.

A new event for us this year was Studio Without Walls presented by ArtCity and the City of Eugene. The event occurred three times during the summer on the West Park block of downtown Eugene. Eugene Printmakers (EP) joined an impressive array of artists including painters, sculptors, dancers, musicians and more to create an outdoor open studio. The artists demonstrated their creative skills and invited the public to work along side them. Hundreds of people that attended had the opportunity to try different mediums, often for the first time. EP allowed people to pull prints on both etching presses and letterpresses, and demonstrated carving blocks and printing by hand.

In September, we were invited back to Lane Arts Council's Fiesta Cultural, and again asked to carve and print posters for the event. Last year Sean O'Reilly, our vice-president, built a custom frame to hold the large blocks and we used a lawn roller (the type usually towed behind a lawnmower) to print the posters. We perfected our technique this year and multiplied our production. The posters were in high demand, and we printed nonstop throughout the evening, drawing a crowd each time we used the lawn roller. We also had a letterpress station set up so kids could print a card with an image of a Mayan-style animal.

We held our fourth annual Pints & Prints in December, once again at Claim 52 Brewing. This event is our biggest fundraiser, and we had another successful evening of assisting both kids and adults in printing their own holiday cards. Like previous years, people could choose to try relief, monotype, or letterpress printing to create their cards, and even had the option to carve their own illustration in linoleum, then print it. Proceeds from this and previous events will be used in our effort to establish a community printmaking studio that is affordable and open to all.

We are looking forward to what 2018 holds, and to getting inky as often as possible.

bottom of page