Ink & Paper: A Printmaker's Art

Canada''s foremost woodcut artist is celebrated in this career retrospective featuring 250 prints. Walker is well-known for his book-length, wordless works on influential Canadians such as Leonard Cohen, Pierre Trudeau, and Conrad Black -- each rendered completely in hand-press-printed woodblock illustrations. Ink and Paper features these unique projects in depth, alongside dozens of stand-alone pieces collected for the first time. For nearly 50 years (and more than 1,000 wood engravings) Canada''s pre-eminent woodcut artist has created narratives to illustrate important figures in Canadian art, politics and history, as well as the literary works of others (Neil Gaiman); this book is a fitting retrospective. The images are fabulous. Ink and Paper will appeal to anyone interested in contemporary Canadian art, printmaking, wordless narrative story-telling and book arts. Whether viewed as stand-alone prints or sequential visual narratives, Walker''s handprinted black and white relief print images tell fascinating, interesting and important stories.

"Ink and paper are my muses. Using hand press printing and printers'' ink to create original prints has absorbed me for the last 47 years. I love the qualities of all papers, especially fine rag papers and washi papers. Their tactile and soft surfaces beg to receive ink and I am always happy to oblige them."
-- George A. Walker

George A. Walker is one of Canada''s foremost woodcut artists. Over the past 40 years Walker has created more than 1,000 wood engravings to illustrate seven wordless books and countless prints covering subjects ranging from literary works to half-remembered dreams, to historical figures and events.

Ink and Paper is a collection of the best of Walker''s work from the 1970s to the present. The book is a complete survey of his career, with over 250 prints -- including many from his wordless novels about important figures in Canadian art, politics and history -- as well as photos of Walker''s handmade limited edition books. Each carefully selected image, complete in itself, is paired on the facing page with a complementary image that enhances the visual experience. Ink and Paper is capped with an afterword by Tom Smart, curator, essayist and director of the Beaverbrook Art Gallery.

Walker attributes his fascination with woodcuts and their use in wordless novels to attending an exhibition featuring the work of Frans Masereel, the first master of the wordless novel. After the exhibition he began an obsessive pursuit to find books illustrated with woodcuts, wood engravings and linocuts, and to learn everything he could about fine art printmaking and the art of wood engraving.

The result of that obsession is a four-decade career and an astounding body of work -- celebrated here for the first time in this gorgeous retrospective.

• | Author: George A. Walker
• | Publisher: Firefly Books Ltd
• | Publication Date: Sep 01, 2023
• | Number of Pages:
• | Language:
• | Binding: Hardback
• | ISBN-13: 9780228104384
• | ISBN-10: 0228104386