Pressing Matters #36

Pressing Matters magazine is a publication full of inky inspiration, celebrating the best of modern printmaking from around the world. Made by printmakers for printmakers. Expect inky fingers, creative workspaces, sketchbooks and artworks – across all kinds of techniques and mediums. 

Any form of art is a form of power – it has impact, it can affect change. It can not only move us, it makes us move,” once said Pablo Picasso. The power of printmaking is something of a theme in this issue – from stories of love, hope and justice with social pioneer Corita Kent to the humorous yet emotive prints of Wuon-Gean Ho – the ability for art to conjure a feeling, evoke an emotion or encourage action are all present here. 

Featured artists include an exciting group of deep thinkers with a knack of harnessing their art to bring change into their worlds and that of others – whether it’s through community engagement, sharing their time-earned knowledge, or simply in how they apply ink to paper.

Issue 36

Nostalgia, joy, melancholy, big feelings, moments of lightness – printmaking has a way of capturing the things we cannot touch and it’s evident that our featured artists are happy to let their materials show them the way to illustrate these feelings and emotions – slowing down and taking time to look carefully at their work and the world around them. Their choices of how ink sits on paper, the subtle mix of colours and the space between shapes all add up to a visual language they call their own. 

Consider Lisa Takahashi’s modern take on Hokusai’s Mount Fuji series, for example – a print that is made using the same medium and of the same mountain, but with a twist that includes her own journey, heritage and relationship with the artist. It’s great to see Blaise Drummond’s energetic sketches in his article – proof, if you need it, that the simplest of drawings can lead to the finest of prints. To quote illustrator Nathaniel Russell, “I think of printmaking as a guitar pedal – if my drawing is the song or the notes on a guitar, the printmaking process is the filter through which I lose control and become more than I am.”