Clotheslines

The clothesline is a recurring theme in my collagraphs, recalling nostalgic ideas of family activities and chores, who did what and when and was it fun or a burden. Even the smell of fresh clothes and sheets is evoked as well as textures. Social and economic status is implied. The setting of the clothesline is important, too: lobster pots, between tenements or barns, by the sea. The oil paint inking of each print varies because each print is created using different colors.

Blue Stocking Girls
Medium - Collagraph
Size
Price – 13 ½ x 11 ½

Sly humor here. Blue stocking was the label for women who were brainy.
When I had strips of silk organza, I played with them, and pretty soon I had shapes that reminded me of those terrible stockings that I wore at a girls college.
For Sale
Medium - Collagraph
Size – 23 ½ x 17 ½
Price

These dresses brought it all back to me. The store window said it all. The way we dressed to attract men, to brag about something, maybe to look pretty or distinguished, or maybe that we didn’t care. Nobody I knew had a mother who looked even remotely like that. Regarding my plate making, to make the New England typical façade, I used pieces of tape as guidelines and moved the plaster like modeling paste on it. Then I removed the tape and in between the clapboards the space became a dark line on my print.
Hang Up
Medium - Collagraph
Size – 11 x 13
Price

Carribean clothes are hung close to the building. I noticed this as I was walking to church. I liked the whimsy of this crazy arrangement.
Winter Socks
Medium - Collagraph
Size – 23 ¾ x 17 ½
Price

Look out the window at the night sky, it’s so crisp and brilliant under the moon. Can anything be as wonderful as frozen socks dripping with frost and floating under the starry sky.
Breezy
Medium - Collagraph
Size - 23 x 17
Price

What a strange assortment of garments on that vacation clothes line. From underwear to kitchen towels to night shirts and blue jeans. All waving on the fringe of a stormy sea.
Gracies Line
Medium - Collagraph
Size – 23 ½ x 17 ½
Price

Gracie was a mysterious healer. Were these clothes forgotten as the night sky closed in? They hang over rocky layers. I used bits of cloth dripping with glues to provoke a scarry setting.
Little House
Medium - Collagraph
Size -
Price

The shapes on the line hanging from this little country house seem to move with the fresh night air. This is a messy little print; the paper is much more uneven than it looks, but it carries the mood of the hour.
Mexican Quilts
Medium - Collagraph
Size
Price

I took a workshop in a remote corner of Mexico a couple of years ago. I was fascinated with the shapes of the buildings and the colors of these quilts for sale so one day I sat on the curb and made plates from scraps. An assemblage with fragments of cardboard that I found, the top of a Kleenex box and corragated cardboard .
Staying Inside or Going Outside?
Medium - Collagraph
Size - 24 ¾ x 22
Price

This is about clothes stuck for a moment in a wash basket. They seem to hold a challenge for me. Do I go outside and put them on the clothesline or pop them inside the dryer? It’s a no brainer – I prefer outside. Notice all the textures on different parts of the plate. This is a very experimental print. It’s basically a painting. There is only one of these available.
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