Fringed Gentian II

About the Work

From the Artist

Flowers are the stars for a myriad of activities and events including love, romance, beauty, poetry, festivities, weddings, funerals, peace, springtime, renewal, and the list goes on. It’s well known that flowers are thought to enhance moods and relieve stress. Every fruit begins with a flower. Flowers remove carbon dioxide and toxins in the air. They feed honeybees that propagate food crops. As we head into an uncertain future it seems fitting to elevate flowers to the rank of "superstars" in a quest to deter the darkness of pollution and global warming.
_{—Excerpted from http://dwightpogue.com/, accessed 7-8-2001}
 

In 1985 I began a series of wildflowers that took my family on springtime hikes around western Massachusetts.  We used as our trail guide the book Fifty Hikes in Massachusetts by my Smith College colleague and friend, geology professor John Brady. A 1902 edition of F. Schuyler Mathews Field Book of American Wild Flowers served as our flower guide. 

A friend of mine, Audrey Pomeroy invited me to her home near the Chesterfield Gorge where we located an array of interesting blossoms including Indian Pipe, Jack in the Pulpit, and Painted Trilliums.  In early September we found rare Fringed Gentians adorning a sunny hillside near Pioneer Valley High School in Westhampton.

 In August of 1986, I was invited to make a print at Brandywine Print Workshop in Philadelphia. Since all of my prints for the past several years incorporated twelve to fifteen color plates, I decided to make a print limited to only four or five colors.  For my subject, I chose the exotic little wildflower, ‘Fringed Gentian.’ The Fringed Gentian is a small blossom that grows wild in New England meadows and on open hillsides and if the blossoms are picked the plant dies. They bloom only in sunshine and appear as stunning violet and purple gems contrasting with the yellow and brown fall grasses that surround them. I completed my first Fringed Gentian print in July and was highly pleased with how it turned out. I decided to make another for my Brandywine project. 

It was a hot mid-August day when I arrived at Brandywine Studio on Kater Street.  Alan met me at the door and gave me a tour of the studio then introduced me to master printer Robert Franklin.  I found them friendly, welcoming, and radiating an enthusiasm that was not only comforting but inspired me to do my very best.

Visiting artists were housed in a nicely equipped apartment upstairs with a series of windows that overlooked Kater Street, which was lined mostly with neighborhood apartments in our ‘City of Brotherly Love.’ I fondly recall nights looking out the open windows watching and listening to all the social activity taking place on the street. During those memorable women’s rights, I read Jack London’s The Sea Wolf, which was his attempt to answer whether man’s life on earth was guided by a divine purpose or simply by chance London called ‘Flotsam Jetsam.’ On my second night I was given a walking tour from the studio to Independence Hall and the Liberty Bell by University of the Arts printmaking professor Patti Smith and her husband.

I was equally impressed that Brandywine printed lithographs using a rotary offset press as I was no stranger to offset printing fine artworks having spent two years using one at the Bradford College of Art in England on a Fulbright scholarship. At that time in America, there were few master printer studios fortunate enough to offer ‘offset’ lithography. Collaborating with Robert Franklin was easygoing and educational as I enjoyed drawing with graphite and spraying airbrush tonal gradations onto several frosted Mylar sheets which we exposed to light-sensitive lithography plates that Robert registered and printed on the offset press. Each time Robert pulled a proof we pinned it on the wall and discussed how it worked and whether I was satisfied or not. One huge advantage of this type of lithography is that rather than start a whole new drawing, it’s a simple matter to alter the drawing already on Mylar by erasing to lighten or if necessary to add value to darken and strengthen the image. A new plate could then be exposed, developed, and placed on the press. I recall Robert suggesting once we should add more ink and print it darker so the white fringes stood out better. Robert was a pure delight to work with as he told many fascinating and often humorous stories, and all the while was most professional in his craft as he held himself and Brandywine to the highest standards.  It was a fabulous experience I have never forgotten.
_{—From Brandywine Workshop and Archives records}

This print is an early version of a subject that has encompassed Dwight Pogue's decades-long practice of exploring flower compositions. While this dark flower is enlarged and pushes to the border of the composition, leaving little room for background, later works become flashy, hard-edged, and bursting with kinetic backgrounds. As part of his images' evolution, Pogue came to think of his flowers as active players—superheroes, even—in a battle for this planet's environment.
_{—From Brandywine Workshop and Archives records}