Face to Face: Twelve American Wood Engravers (Twelve Contemporary Artists Interpret Themselves in a Limited Edition of Original Wood Engravings)

Penmaen Busyhaus Publications, 1985. Limited Edition "Out of Series" Print Set (Not numbered, not in a slipcase). Folio [39 cm] Two suites of loose prints (the suites are issued in two states). 13 prints printed on white paper, 12 of which are signed; 13 prints printed on cream-colored paper, 12 of which are signed. The images on the cream-colored paper are the same as the images on the white paper, the only difference being the paper. The 13th print in each suite is by Lynd Ward. They are not signed, as he passed away in June of 1985, just before the project was completed. *Does not contain the introduction by Leonard Baskin or the descriptive letterpress text. With signed self-portraits by the following artists:

Fred Becker (1913-2004). Born in Oakland, California, and active in St. Louis, Missouri and New England.

Jack Coughlin (b. 1932). Born in Greenwich, Connecticut. He studied at the Rhode Island School of Design in Providence and the Art Students League of New York. He is most known for his portrait wood engravings, etchings, and lithographs of literary figures and musicians. (Information obtained from Brier Hill Gallery, Boston, MA).

John DePol (1913-2004). A New York printmaker and wood engraver. His press was Endgrain Press.

Fritz Eichenberg (1901-1990). A German/American artist. Considered a master of wood engraving. Eichenberg's first big commissions came with Crime and Punishment and Gulliver's Travels for the Limited Editions Club. His images often depict suffering and poverty. His positions included director of Graphic Arts Center in Brooklyn and a teacher of Graphics at New York's Pratt Institute. (Westmont Ridley-Tree Museum of Art)

Raymond Gloeckler (1928-2022). Born in Portage, Wisconsin. While still a student, he taught art, via a government program, in rural schools. Later, he was employed as a professor at UW-Madison between 1961-1993.
"Gloeckler is known for his highly detailed caricatures, and bold, expressive, satire and commentary. His prints and paintings comment on humanity's follies and foibles in a unique light-hearted style defying art world trends." - Gallery of Wisconsin Art

James Grashow (b. 1942). An American sculptor and woodcut artist.
"James Grashow was born in Brooklyn in 1942 and has been creating works that address themes of man, nature and mortality since the 1960's"
"The scale of his work ranges from large environmental installations, through which the viewer traverses, to the delicate and contained world of his houseplants, where homes and buildings replace flowers and buds in intricately constructed bouquets." - The artist's website

Judith Jaidinger (b. 1941). One of the two female artists represented here. Born in Chicago, Illinois.
"Judith Jaidinger's obsession with cutting began in her 1960s student days at the School of the Art Institute, and is linked to her equally long, frankly sensuous relationship with boxwood. She was introduced to both in an engraving class taught by British-born print-master Adrian Troy...
"At the same time, printing industry technology had moved on, supplanting woodblock engravings with line drawings and photography. 'A dying art,' Jaidinger says. It was also a seriously slumping industry. But in the 1960s in Chicago, hub of an enormous catalog business, there were still a few commercial wood-engraving establishments turning out the precise, detailed images more typical of the previous century. One of them, Sander Wood Engraving, on Dearborn Street, was where Professor Troy, a committed modernist, sent his students to buy the best material: rare, English-grown, boxwood blocks...
"'He warned us,' Jaidinger recalls, 'If you go to Sander and buy your wood from them, don't look at what those engravers are doing. I don't want you to be influenced by them.'
"That made it irresistible." - Reader- Chicago's alternative nonprofit newsroom

Michael McCurdy (1942-2016). American author, illustrator, and publisher. Born in New York City. McCurdy served as an instructor at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, at Concord Academy, and at the Book Arts Laboratory of the Wellesley College Library. He founded Penmaen Press (1968-1985). (Information obtained from Brier Hill Gallery, Boston, MA).

Stefan Martin (1936-1994). Born in Elgin, Illinois, and a graduate of the Art Institute of Chicago. He was also active in Roosevelt, New Jersey. His work is held in private museums and collections throughout the world, including the Metropolitan Museum and the Smithsonian Institution.

Barry Moser (b. 1940). The owner and operator of The Pennyroyal Press, and the illustrator of over 250 books, including Moby Dick, The Divine Comedy, and a highly regarded edition of The Bible.
"Barry Moser is probably the most important book illustrator working in America today." - Nicholas Basbanes

Gillian Tyler (b. 1935). Born in Baltimore, Maryland. She is an illustrator that works primarily in children's books.

Herbert Ogdon Waters (1903-1996). Born in China. Waters came to the United States and studied at the Pennsylvania Museum School of Industrial Art in Philadelphia, the Art Institute of Chicago, and Harvard University. He was a public school art instructor under the auspices of the Works Progress Administration's Federal Arts Project. He later taught art at the University of New Hampshire at Durham, and at the Holderness School in Plymouth, New Hampshire. (Information obtained from Brier Hill Gallery, Boston, MA).


Originally issued in an edition of 250 boxed sets.