September 2020 Featured Artists

Visit us during the month of September to view our featured artists Marquita Green with her wood turnings and Joseph Green with letterpress printing.

Marquita Green- Woodturning

Marquita Green

Artist Statement
I began woodworking about 35 years ago, when I bought a used multi-purpose woodworking machine. One function of the machine is woodturning. The immediacy of turning fit my life at the time – 2 children, a part-time job, and a husband in grad school. Woodturning felt like
magic!
When I moved to Longview in 1986 I took a woodturning class from Leonard Bean, and I met Debra Chase through a coop preschool. Debra saw a small piece I’d turned for a school fundraiser, and she encouraged me to consider displaying work at The Broadway Gallery. I was accepted as a member, and continued as an active artist and member for about 14 years. But I am restless. Woodturning lost some of its magic after a while. I veered into grad school and subsequently to a career teaching English as a Second Language.
Still, woodturning retained an allure, and over the last years I have gradually accumulated a body of work. Many of my turnings have a strong sculptural quality, so it seemed natural to make an occasional sculpture that did not involve using a lathe. A couple of these are in this show, along with turned works of the last 5 years. I hope you enjoy it; I certainly enjoyed making it.
Marquita Green
August, 2020

Joseph Green-Letterpress Printing

Joseph Green

Letterpress Printing from The Peasandcues Press
My introduction to letterpress printing—setting metal type by hand, one letter at a time, and using the composed form to print a page—came in a graphic arts class at California State University, Long Beach, in 1968; however, I didn’t acquire my first press until 1999. From there, I started printing my own poems until I felt confident enough to print broadsides for other poets.

While Marquita often contributes woodcuts or linocuts to accompany the poems that I print, I have increasingly been interested in collagraphy, using surface textures for background effects and images. I have also been returning to my poems, presenting them through the same methods I had been using for other poets’ work, as well as printing individual quotations that appeal to me. Some of those pieces are included in this exhibit. Aside from “Görlitz,” for which the type was cast on a Monotype Composition Caster at the C.C. Stern
Foundry, all of these prints were set by hand at the Peasandcues Press.
Everything here was printed on a 1956 Vandercook #4 proof press.

Joseph Green
The Peasandcues Press