A friend told me that at my parents’ Fiftieth Wedding Anniversary he asked my dad what the secret was to being married that long. My dad said that it was ‘Easy, just get married and wait!’
Apparently having a cool newspaper is the same. I bought this fifty years ago (with my pre-kindergarten milk money…honest) and have moved it around all these years.
I can’t imagine thinking about 2019 when I bought it.
Here’s a great show that features engravers, small letterpress printshops, unbelievable bookbinding and many related artisans as well as printing ephemera and books.
….and us, Raven Press.
Come early, see the show then take a hike along a wooded trail on top of the nearby Niagara Escarpment!
These hay pulleys ran along a track near the peak of the barn roof. The bottom pulley clipped onto a large fork that dropped down and stuck into loose hay on the wagon just in from the field. The rope was attached to a team of horses that would pull the hay up to where it could be dropped into the loft. Hot, dusty, sweaty work.
This is a four colour print with an image area 28 x 34 cm (11×14.5 inches)
A brief respite from a slow going, very detailed engraving. A small, 2 colour engraving of a nude. It’s a closeup because I do a terrible job of faces, and hands, and feet…and other parts as well. 
We’re working like crazy getting the new studio in shape for the tour so, if you can, plan on coming around the weekend after Thanksgiving.
This is a great show if you’re interested in letterpress printing and the related arts. If you make it, be sure to drop by our booth.
This was my entry into the Tarot Lovers show, a (somewhat cynical :- ) three colour engraving.
Not sure where the graphic of the hands came from. If they gave me a really, really big bottle of wine and said ‘Draw us some hands’ I could have done that.
Mind you, in the morning I would have looked at it, thrown it out, and said ‘Hold on, I can do better.’
Here’s a great way to meet the Artists, to see the art and the studios of 43 Artists.
Please do drop by 7 Preston St. a block north of Waterloo Ave. just west of Glasgow. 
The Luther Marsh is a large, man made lake that affords sanctuary for many, many birds, migratory and otherwise. Areas of it still have the trees that died when the area was flooded and some of these support nests like the Blue Heron nest in my print.
A few posts ago I had a sketch of some rock in the north end of the Georgian Bay; here’s a nine colour, 9×12 engraving from that sketch. Sit still long enough to sketch and birds come by, turtles, lizards and snakes poke their heads out from hiding and, usually, an enormous ant takes a bite of some bit of exposed butt cheek.
A week camping and canoeing through the Georgian Bay archipelago brushes stress away like a broom through cobwebs. Perfect canoe weather with lots of sun and more sun and even more sun. 
If you’re around St Thomas between this Friday, November 27 and December 24th you can enjoy seeing the Group Show in Illuminé Gallery. If you’re there this Friday between 7:00 -9:00 pm. you’re welcome to drop in, meet the Artists and enjoy the Opening Night festivities.
Busy cleaning up my studio ’cause it’s almost here….The 2015 Studio Tour. 42 Artists and Artisans in their studios and exhibition places.
Visit www.guelphstudiotour.ca for more info!
One hundred years ago one of Guelph’s better known sons, Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae, a soldier, physician and poet wrote ‘In Flanders Fields.
As part of exhibitions marking the occasion the Guelph Museum is hosting a juried exhibition of related artworks. My print ‘The Survivors’ was one of the artworks chosen.
To me the war conjures up visions of more than poppies and crosses. I envision the other casualties of war, of the long lines of refugees and of wounded soldiers returning to their homes. I see the shells of buildings and a landscape badly scarred.
My print was for those people who, having survived, were now ready to move forward towards a sparse landscape but one with a promise of better things to come.
The poem reads as follows:
In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.
We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.
Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields. .
clive lewis, printmaker 