Laurence Barker
If one is willing to entertain the reciprocation or dialogue of printed images with exuberant paper, then the step from pulp painting to printmaking is small. The conventional rationale for quiet, uninflected white paper is to eliminate all distractions from the printed image. Against this irreproachable logic, however, lies the sheer theatricality of the composite image of print and paper which raises a novel set of esthetic considerations. It is precisely in the hyphen between support and medium, where ground becomes figure, that much untapped poetry resides, acting paper that is in turn acted upon. Like a rheostat, paper can be easily dialed down, as it were, to near-zero assertiveness of pure support -- i.e., sheets that are white, smooth, and square -- as it can be cranked up through stages to an intensity of activity that is pure protagonism.
Barker has exhibited and lectured widely in Europe and South America. He has also made paper for Joan Miró, Antonio Tapiés, Eduardo Chillida, Roy Lichenstein, Jasper Johns, David Hockney and Kenneth Noland among others.
Images from Left to Right
Jardin Botanico, etching, 2001
Cloud Nine, etching, 2001
Memorial Day, etching, 2001
Purple Bracket, etching, 2000
Night in Tunisia, etching, 2000