Monday, November 15, 2010

Peter Kuper Prints at Buddha Cat Press

Peter Kuper and Buddha Cat Press are releasing a limited edition print and t-shirt!

Ying Yang is a one color silkscreen to be included in the Evolution Revolution: The Interconnectedness of All Beings exhibition.
Based on a linoleum cut by the artist.
Signed and Numbered.
Edition of 50.
15" x 22" on Stonehenge paper.
$60 plus shipping and handling.

Artist's Statement:
"When I quoted Saul Bellow's line " In an age of madness to be untouched by madness is a form of madness" to my cat, she replied,
"Prrrrrrrrr"
I couldn't have agreed more and promptly created this image."
-Peter Kuper




SPECIAL OFFER!
Buy a limited edition t-shirt of Phoenix Cat in addition to your print for only $75! *T-shirts sold individually at $25.




Bio:
Peter Kuper co-founded of the political zine World War 3 Illustrated and has remained on its editorial board for 30 years.
His illustrations and comics have appeared in Time, The New York Times and MAD where he has illustrated SPY vs. SPY every month since 1997. He has written and illustrated over twenty books including The System and Stop Forgetting To Remember.

Peter has also adapted Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle and many of Franz Kafka’s works into comics including an award winning version of The Metamorphosis. Peter lived in Oaxaca, Mexico from July 2006-2008 and his work from that time can be seen in can be seen in his latest book Diario de Oaxaca.

Phoenix Cat design by Peter Kuper.


Options
T-Shirt Sizes




Thursday, November 11, 2010

Evolution/ Revolution: the Interconnectedness of All Beings


FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Press Contact: Bita Shafipour
info@EvolutionRevolutionArt.org

LOS ANGELES, CA – November 9, 2010 - Evolution/Revolution: The Interconnectedness of All Beings is a collaborative art exhibition and forum between Buddha Cat Press, nine renowned visual artists, Santa Monica Art Studios and SoCiArts Productions. The team has come together to produce a socially conscious exhibition focusing on animal welfare and the environment.

The mission of this project is to use art to open new dialogues and explore human perceptions about nature and the environment, awakening and inviting people to make more conscious decisions about their food, clothing, pet and lifestyle choices. Through the astonishing work of these nine prominent artists, the producers wish to bear witness for those beings who do not have a voice and to contribute to the shift in consciousness which is needed to end pain and suffering for all beings. The exhibition also includes a vibrant forum of activists, educators, filmmakers and thinkers who deal with the subject of animal liberation. Now is the time to start a social movement through art and dialogue, a revolution in humanity and an evolution of consciousness.

The exhibition is curated by Karen Fiorito and features the work of William Wegman, Robbie Conal, Sue Coe, Gee Vaucher, Peter Kuper, Yuri Shimojo, Emek, Cole Gerst and Karen Fiorito with an installation by Pouya Afshar. The show runs from February 19 through March 26, 2011 at the Santa Monica Art Studios – Arena 1 Gallery at 3026 Airport Avenue, Santa Monica, CA 90405.

Opening Reception: February 19, 2011 5 – 9 PM
Artist Panel: February 20, 2011 3 – 5 PM
Gallery Hours: Wednesday – Sunday 12 – 6 PM


For more information on the art exhibition and the events please visit:
www.EvolutionRevolutionArt.org

To contribute to our Kickstarter campaign, please go to: http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/evolutionrevolution/


The Artists:

• William Wegman was born in Holyoke, Massachusetts, in 1943. He graduated from the Massachusetts College of Art, Boston, in 1965 with a BFA in painting, then enrolled in the Masters painting and printmaking program at the University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana, receiving an MFA in 1967. After teaching at various universities, Wegman’s interests in areas beyond painting ultimately led him to photography and the infant medium of video.


His most recent exhibitions have gone to Japan, Sweden, and the Orange County Museum of Art in California. Wegman lives in New York and Maine.


• Robbie Conal grew up on the upper west side of Manhattan--his parents were both union organizers who considered the major art museums to be day care centers for him. He attended the High School of Music and Art in New York, got his BFA at San Francisco State University and his Masters of Fine Arts degree at Stanford University.


He developed an irregular guerrilla army of volunteers and put his posters up in the streets of major cities around the country. He has made more than 50 posters satirizing politicians from both parties, televangelists and global capitalists. He also takes on issues of censorship, the Supreme Court's ruling against women's freedom of choice, and environmental issues.


• Sue Coe is one of the most important politically oriented artists living in the U.S. today. From the outset of her career working as an illustrator for such publications as the New York Times and Time Magazine, Coe was committed to reaching a broad audience through the print media.


Widely written about and exhibited, Coe has appeared on the cover of Art News and been the subject of a retrospective exhibition at the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden in Washington, D.C. Her work is in the collections of many major museums, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Museum of Modern Art in New York.


• Despite her much sought after work as an illustrator and later as a painter, gee vaucher is perhaps best known for the extensive body of work she created during the late seventies and early eighties. quite apart from her now famous collages, as designer with the renowned punk band ‘crass’, she concentrated her highly developed painting skills on ‘photorealism’, creating some of the most disturbing and acclaimed images of the time. Her work is generally accepted as having been seminal to the iconography of the ‘punk generation’.


Most of her work since then has in some way been connected with the human form, intimately exploring the psychological diversities of social inter-relationships. she has been exhibited extensively both solo and in group shows throughtout the world.


• Yuri Shimojo is drawn to the world of indigenous cultures, which has led her studying universal shamanism as an energy worker. Yuri has published several books in Japan, including: “Makkana Mangetsu~Crimson Full Moon”(1995), which showcase her earlier illustration works, “Vagabonds” (2001), a journal work from her trip in Central America and Mexico, and “Chiisana Rakugaki~Tiny Scribble” (1997), an autobiography of her unique childhood, which has republished in 2007.


Now, living the nomadic bohemian lifestyle, Yuri explores the planet from the heart of metropolis to the outposts all over the world being guided by her own intuition, hopping between her home base and studio in Brooklyn to her tropical “boonie” hideaway in Hawaii. These extreme opposites from jungle to urban life balances her creative & spiritual yin and yang always bringing new sources of inspiration.


• Emek graduated with a Major in Art, and a Minor in Unemployment. His first poster commission was done immediately after the L.A. riots/uprising of 1992, for a unity rally and concert held on Martin Luther King Day. The poster was a success and from then on, Emek was hooked on the art form.


In Emek’s posters, psychedelic ‘60s imagery collides with ‘90s post-industrial iconography. To this collision of the organic vs. the mechanical worlds he adds humor, social commentary and fantasy. Even in the smallest details there are messages. All of Emek’s artwork is originally hand-drawn and then hand- silkscreened for each actual concert or event, usually in limited editions of around 300.


• Peter Kuper co-founded of the political zine World War 3 Illustrated and has remained on its editorial board for 30 years. His illustrations and comics have appeared in Time, The New York Times and MAD where he has illustrated SPY vs. SPY every month since 1997. He has written and illustrated over twenty books including The System and Stop Forgetting To Remember.


Peter has also adapted Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle and many of Franz Kafka’s works into comics including an award winning version of The Metamorphosis. His graphic novel, Sticks and Stones, won the Society of Illustrators gold medal Peter lived in Oaxaca, Mexico from July 2006-2008 and his work from that time can be seen in can be seen in his latest book Diario de Oaxaca.


• Cole Gerst is a graphic artist and painter in Los Angeles, California. Originally from the deep south of Albany, Georgia, he grew up surrounded by many outsider and folk artists, including his grandfather, a respected local craftsman. As a kid, Cole enjoyed many of these artists’ fantastical stories about faraway lands, or conversations with Higher Powers. He was inspired by their ability to create art that revealed the world as only they saw it.


He now heads up the firm, option-g, which is a multidisciplinary design firm which provides illustration, graphic design, art commisions and animation to the music and entertainment industry. Option-G also includes a t-shirt company, option-g apparel, that releases a new line twice a year.


• Karen Fiorito is a political artist and curator residing in Los Angeles, California. She has been exhibited in over 50 exhibitions and has had 5 solo shows. Her art continues to be exhibited nationally and internationally and has appeared in such publications as Art in America, the Philadelphia Inquirer, Hustler Magazine, the LA Weekly, URB Magazine and the Huffington Post.

Friday, October 15, 2010

Monet Clark's Thanka Prayer Blessing Incantation Medicine Spells



We are proud to announce the completion of Monet Clark's series "Thanka Prayer Blessing Incantation Medicine Spells."

This serigraph is eleven colors with very fine detail (no that is not pencil lines you see but pencil lines translated to silk screen!)

Individual prints are $30, and the four printed together as one print (as sh
own) is $85.

Here is also a flyer for the show in which these prints will debut. See you there!

Please contact monetclark@mac.com for more information!




Saturday, August 7, 2010

"Hope" Raises Money for Hollywood Arts


Los Angeles-based artist Karen "Fury" Fiorito released "Hope," a six color print based on a photograph that speaks volumes about homelessness. With her belief that printmaking itself is a political act, "Hope" artfully questions society's perception of homelessness. From her artist statement:

“"Hope" depicts a homeless shelter underneath a sign for the Hope Sportswear Corporation, a corporation which has gone extinct. Underneath are the facts: 'Approximately 3.5 million people, 1.3 million of them children are likely to experience homelessness is a given year.' Hope has become the new catch phrase, but for whom do we speak? Many people think that homeless people are mentally ill or have drug problems, but this is not the case. They are people like you and me, only one mistake or circumstance away from being out on the streets. Many of them are victims of domestic violence, children, and war veterans. Regardless, all people, all sentient beings, deserve love and respect. All beings deserve hope."


“Hope”
6 color serigraph
printed at Self-Help Graphics by Mater Printer Jose Alpuch.
Edition size 77
19" x 25.5"
6 colors
$200 plus Shipping/Handling
Signed and numbered by artist

90% of the profits will go to help Hollywood Arts.
Hollywood Arts is a ground breaking educational facility that uses art and music-based learning to help high-risk young people over the age of 18 improve self-esteem, develop thinking skills, master educational concepts and receive job-readiness training.

Hollywood Arts provides classes in arts, music and media, at no cost, to
young people in transition ages 18 to 24—young people who are homeless or
transitioning out of foster care.


Please contact karen@buddhacatpress.com for more information.

Monday, August 2, 2010

Buddha Cat on the Huffington Post!

Thanks to our friend Matt Gleason for this awesome article on our show at Urban Sanctuary!

Screenprinting Survey Spans the Streets to the Sublime:

The Work of Buddha Cat Press at Urban Sanctuary Gallery, Boyle Heights, July 16 - July 31

Karen Fiorito's Buddha Cat Press enjoyed a small survey show at the Urban Sanctuary gallery in Boyle Heights. BCP has published and produced screen print editions for an impressive panoply of artists. A print from many of these editions was on display along with a large sampling of Karen's own politically charged work.

2010-08-01-conal.jpg
Robbie Conal's Dalai Lama portrait includes a layer of gold leafing

Any small screen-printing publisher would have bragging rights for publishing or co-producing an edition by just one of the many big names that Buddha Cat Press had in this exhibit. In the show, L.A.'s original street artist Robbie Conal had two triptychs published under Karen's supervision in the past few years, each featuring an iconic portrait (Dalai Lama, Hendrix, etc.) with a slogan underneath which comprise a larger theme and summarize the works of these men.

2010-08-01-WSmith.jpg
Winston Smith's arresting critique of organized religion is familiar to any aficionado of punk rock

If Conal is too hippie for you, Fiorito has co-published work by Britain's Gee Vaucher, the artist who worked with Crass, as well as Winston Smith, responsible for adding the most arresting images to Dead Kennedys albums. In fact, Smith's image of Christ on a cross of money under a barcoded 666 (the cover of the DK's 1981 "In God We Trust Incorporated" EP) was published (in conjunction with Paperworks Laboratories) last September on black background titled simply "Idol".

2010-08-01-elmac_retna.jpg
Street art roots translate seamlessly into fine art, here in a collaboration between El MAc and Retna for Buddha Cat Press

While Conal, Vaucher and Smith establish a punk backbone and political seriousness to the small publisher, Buddha Cat Press has street credibility too. Urban Sanctuary Gallery had BCP editions from well-known graffiti calligraphists Chaz, El Mac and Retna on display along with a print edition on paper of photographer Estevan Oriol.

Amidst these icons, all represented with quality images, expertly presented and hung unframed, backroom style with paper clips, there were fine art prints that extolled themes of beauty and composition. They were without the benefit of an established name; they were, however, exquisite enough that politics were not needed to deliver their message of a search for that tranquil moment of transformation to which all great art aspires.

Buddha Cat Press has not printed itself into a corner with one approach to aesthetics or one type of street slogan. It is the epitome of interesting Los Angeles art to draw from more schools of influence than pizza toppings available at a restaurant; BCP epitomizes the making of a melody by embracing the complete cacophony of L.A. that the best art of our time seems to return to again and again.

There was no theme to be derived from the wide variety of images in this show save for the possibilities that arise when the personal and the political are curatorially interwoven, when the calligraphic and the organic coexist on the same wall space, and all of it under the precise printing skills of Karen Fiorito.

2010-08-01-karen.jpg
Karen Fiorito at Urban Sanctuary Gallery in Boyle Heights

2010-08-01-fiorit.jpg
"Pretty Revolutionary" - a print by Karen Fiorito

Thursday, July 1, 2010

Buddha Cat Show at Urban Sanctuary


Urban Sanctuary presents the work of Buddha Cat Press. Buddha Cat Press is a socially conscious print publishing company located in Downtown, Los Angeles. "Buddha Cat" is an exhibition of prints curated from the archives of Buddha Cat Press.

“Buddha Cat” includes hand-crafted, one-of-a-kind prints which employ multiple processes, such as diffusion dot dither, metallics, glitter and CMYK.

Buddha Cat Press has published and been contracted by such artists as Robbie Conal, Dave Kinsey, Shepard Fairey, Mear One, 3D, Chaz, Kofie, Winston Smith and El Mac. All of these collaborations will be shown, including the work of Master Printer Artist (AKA Print Goddess) Karen (the Fury) Fiorito.

The opening reception will feature live printing and food and refreshments.

Workshops will be given on the 17th, 24th and 31st for stencil making. A closing reception will follow the last workshop on the 31st. All workshops are $30 and include a free t-shirt!

Urban Sanctuary is a gallery and retail location in the emerging area of Boyle Heights. Urban Sanctuary is located at 2026 E. 1st, Los Angeles, CA 90033

Opening Reception: July 16th, 2010

5 pm- 9 pm, food and wine!
Live printing and stenciling!

Stenciling Workshops:
July 17th and 24th 1 pm- 5 pm
July 31st, 12 pm- 3 pm

Closing Reception:
July 31st, 3 pm- 5 pm

For more information please got to buddhacatpress.com, www.urbansanctuaryla.com
or follow us on twitter: twitter.com/buddhacatpress and twitter.com/urbsancla

Tuesday, June 22, 2010

Buddha Dog by Karen Fiorito



Hot of the Press!
5 Color Serigraph with Hand Applied Gold Leaf
Edition Size: 30 (15 with Gold Leaf and 15 with Gold Metallic Ink)
Signed and Numbered.
On Stonehenge Paper. (22" x 30")
$65.00