Wagner Encaustic Collagraph White (WECW) came about in 2004, when I developed and marketed a boutique earth-color line of encaustic paints called Wagner Encaustics. When I stopped making the paints in 2010, I had already re-formulated the white for printmaking and teaching purposes. The specially formulated ratio gives WECW a fluid and milky consistency with a heavy pigment load that easily releases from the paper when printing. It makes for the perfect marriage with Akua soy and honey-based inks, but is not used with oil based inks. For WECW, I created the package labeling, design and literature for WECW. Since stiffer oil based printmaking inks traditionally come in a tin can, I liked the idea of using the same size and type tin familiar to printmakers. Having arrived at developing the perfect combination of materials, in 2016 I presented it at the Southern Graphics Council International (SGCI), the largest annual printmaking conference that attracts over 2,500 academics, students and professionals. I demonstrated to a captive audience of printmakers and met the inventor of Akua Inks, Susan Rostow. I also presented Encaustic Collagraph at the International Encaustic Conference in 2013 and taught a class at Truro Center for the Arts at Castle Hill.
presses, is my off-site teaching. I targeted my workshops towards printmaking shops or “ateliers” around the country, places with presses, plates, paper and inks already there. I have learned over the past five years that every press is definitely different! Unknowingly, working on unfamiliar presses combined with different temperatures and climates sometimes posed surmountable challenges with the wax in terms of it sticking to the paper. I do most of my work at my studio in Portland, Oregon. I am currently continuing another encaustic painting technique that I have been creating my work with for over 20 years that involves trapping air. Having always taken a wabi-sabi approach to my work, I am able to execute surfaces that match the creative intention of my work to depict geologic and moon-like terrains. I am able to further exploit these distinct surfaces through the creation of both my encaustic paintings and collagraphs for printing. I also create graphite rubbings and transfers from the surfaces of my finished pieces before they leave the studio that I then create new work from.
Elise Wagner is an artist based in Portland, Oregon. Subjects of science such as particle physics and astronomy as well as the sublime and the celestial serve as the inspiration for Elise’s work. Elise is a 2015-16 recipient of The Pollock-Krasner Foundation Grant and The greatest challenge for me was assimilating printmaking she exhibits her paintings and prints in Portland, Seattle, Palm Springs and Houston. Elise teaches into my studio practice on my own terms as a painter. Once I encaustic painting workshops and her unique had a press, I was initially scared of it, believe it or not! I had printmaking process in her studio in Portland. She has grown to rely on the master printers to set the press and presented her technique at the Southern Graphics Council International (SGCI) conference and at the International Encaustic Conference in Provincetown, MA. register my paper and it took a few months to assimilate. Since then, Elise has also been invited to teach at several institutions nationally Now, with my own press, I learned all of those things on my and internationally including Center for Contemporary Printmaking Norwalk, CT, own, augmenting my studio accordingly to accommodate Women’s Studio Workshop Rosendale, NY, R&F Handmade Paints, Kingston, NY, Truro Center for the Arts at Castle Hill, Truro, MA, Piramidal Grafica, Guanajuato, both my printing and painting practice along with my Mexico, Metchosin Summer School for the Arts, Victoria, BC and Burning Bones workshop programming. Another thing that has been Press in Houston. This September, she will be teaching at the Robert Blackburn Printmaking Workshop at the Elizabeth Foundation of the Arts in New York City 28 and Pyramid Atlantic in the Washington, D.C. area. http://www.elisewagner.com challenging but also has schooled me greatly on etching