Overview:
The Woodstock School of Art hosts its Monoprint Invitational Exhibition and Auction September 13-October 4, showcasing over 60 works created in a weeklong studio marathon.
A monoprint is a curious creature—part painting, part print, wholly one of a kind. Unlike etchings or lithographs, which are designed to produce multiples, a monoprint is a singular impression pulled from a plate, a once-only marriage of ink, paper, and pressure. The artist inks a flat surface—glass, metal, or acrylic—then paints, draws, or scrapes into it. Paper is pressed onto the plate, and the image is transferred, often leaving room for happy accidents: Smudges that become shadows, textures that surprise, colors that bloom. Though the Italian Renaissance painter Giovanni Benedetto Castiglione is credited with inventing the form in the 17th century, many artists were developing the technique independently. In the modern era, Degas, Gauguin, and Matisse embraced monoprinting’s capacity for improvisation.
Improvisation is exactly what animates the Woodstock School of Art’s Monoprint Invitational Exhibition and Auction, opening Saturday, September 13 (2-4pm, with bidding closing at 3:30). For a week this summer, the school’s printmaking studios on Route 212 hummed with the energy of collaboration as a cadre of artists joined forces with master printers Kathy Caraccio, Dan Welden, Lisa Mackie, Julio Valdez, Rie Hagesawa, Opal DeRuvo, Kate McGloughlin, and Laura Moriarty. The result: more than 350 prints pulled in just six days, a kaleidoscopic survey of what’s possible when ink meets paper under pressure.
Over 60 of those works—selected for range and resonance—will be on display during the live auction at the school’s campus, with proceeds directly supporting the Woodstock School of Art’s programs and historic home. It’s a chance not just to snag a one-of-a-kind print, but to participate in a legacy of artistic exchange that stretches back decades.
Heather Caufield, the school’s artistic director, frames the Invitational as both showcase and community ritual. “The annual Woodstock Monoprint Invitational Exhibition is a celebration of printmaking and community, bringing together some of the most talented artists from the Hudson Valley and beyond,” she says. “Each year, artists collaborate with our master printers to create exceptional monoprints, showcasing the vibrant creative community that thrives right here in our spacious, fully equipped printmaking studios.”
Caufield points to the diversity of the works—“from subtle palettes and intricate details to bold, graphic forms”—as evidence of how the medium rewards risk. “Each unique monoprint represents a moment of artistic creation, where the artist’s vision comes to life through a process that celebrates both their individual intuition and the expert guidance of our master printers,” she says.
Executive Director Nina Doyle echoes the sense of dynamism. “The energy in the studios was electric,” she says. “Each year, the teamwork from the artists and the support from the community astounds me. We’re thrilled to now share the results with the public.”
That public will have their chance on September 13, when the auction block becomes a bridge between artists and collectors, students and patrons. (Preview the auction prints.) For three weeks beyond, through October 4, the exhibition remains open at the school’s campus, a living gallery of improvisations fixed to paper. Like the medium itself, the show is fleeting—no two impressions alike, each moment distinctive.
