POSTERS!

Today I'm goin to talk about something near and dear to my heart. Posters. More importantly silk screened posters. My love for this media started about two years ago, and now it's become my main form of art, everything else I do is encompassed by it. Every crazy idea I usually just forget I now scribble downfor future use in a poster... Every painting idea I have I want to go into it with screen printing... I'm now making t-shirts, art prints, mono prints, it's amazing! I think the first time I got interested in silk screened posters was about tow years ago. I was talking to one of my instructors, Bill Harbort, and suddenly Jay Ryan had come into our topic of conversation. He was coming down for about three days, and he was going to screen a poster, and Bill had told me that I was welcome to help if I wanted to. I said, yeah, I might, simply givin him a maybe answer, not realizing what helping Jay Ryan actually meant. Then, in the fall, a week into the semester, I was taking a course of Adv. Independent Graphic Design. I didn't know exactly what to do, and Bill had started talkin about Jay Ryan again and how excited he was about him coming down. Then he suddenly stopped talking and his eyes got real wide and he said, "Dude, Ben, you eveer think about screen printing your design work?" "No, I really haven't," I said, "I took printmaking and I dunno, I don't think I'd like doin it..." "Hmm...ok," Bill said. "But, hey...Have you checked out any of Jay's stuff yet?" he asked. I said, "Nope, not yet...should I?" "Yes...look at his stuff...then let me know what you think about doing silk screen stuff." "All right," I said, not knowing at all what I was getting into...

When I started looking at Jay Ryan's work I was dumbfounded. This is silkscreened? His illustrations were amazing and it was designed soooo well. I had no Idea that screen printing was so awesome! Apparebtly I had never actually figured out how to really use it to it's full potential. And so then, I desided that I was going to do poster design for my Independent course, and I was going to silk screen everything I did. When I started It was really hard. I didn't really know what I was doing. But I still managed to crank out two posters before Jay cam to Minot. Once Jay was here and I was able to see how he printed, my mind soaked up everything he did... he was a true master at pulling ink on the screen. Everything he did, his selection of paper, inks used, design printing techniques, all superb and surprisingly rational. I was amazed to see how he worked. After he left, I was asked to do a poster for a friend of mine, Jazmine Wolff. She was going on tour that winter and wondered if i could make the psoter for it. And, if possible, she wanted them screen printed. I took the project, and decided to go ahead and make an edition of 100. This was a huge leap to what I was used to printing. What I had started printing at was around 5...with maybe 2 or 3 test prints. And I made a startling jump to 100! But I was confident! I knew how Jay did things and I was determined to mimic them best I could, and after 3 days of work, Jazmine's tour poster was finished! I had completed the poster, minus 4 (had problems with 4 of em) and it was a poster advertising an actual event! I was amazed at the work I had just completed and I was so happy with myself. After that moment, I decided that I wanted to pursue a career in poster design and silk screen printing. I love the medium, I love its different avenues of experimentation, and I love how the poster has the power to bring people together to witness the performance of music!

RULESOME.

some links for people interested in posters!-
www.thebirdmachine.com
www.gigposters.com