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Posts Tagged ‘Maureen’s Printmaking Coaching’

The “Maureen’s Kitchen” Cookery Portfolio, Lessons Learned

Posted in Cocina de Maureen, Maureen Booth printmaker, Maureen's Kitchen Granada, Maureen's Printmaking Coaching, Portfolio Prints Recipes, Printmaking Teamwork Granada, tagged La Cocina de Maureen, Maureen Artwork Therapy, Maureen Booth printmaker, Maureen's Printmaking Coaching, printmaking in Granada, Prints/Recipes Portfolio on June 28, 2021| Leave a Comment »

This project wouldn’t have been possible without the invaluable help of my
studio assistant, María José Braojos and her daughter, Silvia Romera Braojos,
as well as Ricardo Calvente Chacón, of the Del Arco Print Shop in Granada.
And, of course, Mike, my photographer, webmaster, and husband.

I Get By With a Little Help from My Friends

Much as I have tried over the past long year to stay positive, I confess it hasn’t always been easy and at times events have taken a toll on my morale. The pandemic took us all by surprise. Life was different and we suspected it would never be the same again, but first we had to survive the virus. (We have a friend who did die–briefly–and came back and told us about it.) We couldn’t see friends and family, which in Spain form the cornerstone of life on this planet. We couldn’t go out for a drink and tapas. Or drive down to the beach. Our life was reduced to a recurring supermarket-pharmacy-laundromat routine. Though, I shouldn’t complain too much. We were never without our inspiring riverside walking path, nor the loving company of Cuca, Diva, Bundy, Rosey and Susu, whom Mike refers to as “our little people.”

As I mentioned before, it was María José who inspired me to get back to work in a serious way. Let me tell a bit about her. She has become for me more of a daughter than a helper. We met 20 years ago when her husband, Juan Carlos Romera, was planning the production of a 38-minute short film called “Bive,” (“Live” in semi-literate Spanish). He needed a foreign woman artist for a story set in a fishing village in the Mediterranean province of Almería. As soon as he saw my studio he said, “You’re the one… and we’ll shoot the studio scenes in here.” María José was his assistant on Bive. Working on the film with Juan Carlos, María José, and his professional crew from Madrid was all new to me. It was hard work during a hot summer, but intensely interesting, and included some good fun. (You can see the complete film here on YouTube.) But I’m meandering again. What makes working with María José so gratifying is her limitless good humor, her sweet demeanor, her careful work, and her readiness to learn. She’s one of the most positive people I’ve ever known.

It Turned Out to Be a Healing Process

So we decided to start on the prints-and-recipes project. I prepared the originals on acetates and when they were all ready María José stepped in to help me burn the plates and pull the prints. That was our usual procedure. What was new in the process was the hand coloring (“illuminating” is the delightful traditional term) of all the prints, for which her help was invaluable. It was an extremely limited edition of 19 portfolios, but each one had 16 prints and they all had to be colored by hand. It was a demanding, meticulous job that required concentration to the exclusion of everything else. That exclusion included all forms of worry, anxiety, or stress.

A few days after we finished illuminating the prints and had wedded them with the introductory texts and the portfolios (which I made to measure myself), and sold the first few books, it occurred to me that I was feeling quite a bit better. People liked the portfolio. I was full of pride and optimism, and had some money jingling in my pocket. I even had some new projects fall into my lap, a couple of portraits and a big job for our village’s new Sierra Nevada tram museum. It seems I have been renewed by a combination of art, work, and loyal friends. I have always prided myself on being a working artist, and this is just one more proof of its miracles.

I wonder if this simple formula might not work for you, too.

P.S. There are still a few portfolios left. If you need one you can contact me via email: maureenluciabooth (at) gmail.com.

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Presenting “Maureen’s Kitchen/La Cocina de Maureen”

Posted in Cocina de Maureen, Hand Illuminated Prints, Maureen Booth printmaster, Maureen's Kitchen Portfolio, Maureen's Printmaking Newsletter, Maureens printmaking workshops, Printmaking Courses Spain, printmaking in Granada, tagged Cocina de Maureen, Happiness Is a Project, Kitchen Print Portfolio, Maureen Booth Printmaestra, Maureen's Printmaking Coaching on May 31, 2021| 15 Comments »

Now Comes the Hard Part; What Will You Think?

Here you have it, a project that has been rambling round my head for years and finally got started three months ago when my assistant, María José, suggested, “We’re not doing much else, why don’t we start on your recipes-with-prints idea? Suddenly, getting up in the morning in the boring and confusing life under Covid controls began to have meaning. It’s true, happiness is a project.

The recipes are my own personal favorites. Some of them I inherited from my mother and grandmother, some from friends and some of the best local dishes from our pueblo, Pinos Genil. I have included some vegetarian dishes and some are my own creative experiments. I hope you will find them interesting. This has been an inspiring learning experience for me and I’m happy to see the result.

Preparing an edition is, beyond the image making, a lot of work. The Spanish would say it’s a combination of “arte y artesanía.” Once you’ve refined your sketches and burned them onto plates, you’ve got all that printing to do by hand. Though this edition is a small one, with only 19 portfolios, each one has 16 prints. Add to that the hand coloring of all of them. Then there was the text. As it is impractical to handwrite the recipes in English and Spanish on plates, the answer was a print shop and all the complication that entails. For both of these problems I had extraordinary luck close at hand. They are named María José, my near-daughter whom you have already met, and our neighbor, Ricardo, who owns one of Granada’s most exquisite print shops, la Imprenta del Arco. I’m forever thankful for his patience with all my changes and his excellent criteria concerning my doubts. And I don’t want to forget María José’s lovely daughter, Silvia Romera Braojos, who did the translation into Spanish and the formatting of the text.

Young Old Friends

So each DIN-A4-sized recipe has Ricardo’s offset text on one side and my hand-pulled original print on the other. One of the advantages of living in the same place for 50 years is that you know whom you can rely on. And our pueblo, Pinos Genil, is a great place to live. I have an added advantage here. In the late 1970s I used to give painting lessons in the town square to all the children who were interested, and today I am privileged to have all of those children as 40-and-50-year-old friends.

I haven’t had much feedback yet, except for our old friend, the doctor/painter, Rafael Sánchez, who dropped by last night for one of his amusing visits. He saw the portfolio, said, “This is art on the outside and art on the inside,” and took one home with him. That was encouraging, Rafa, thank you.

As for how to enjoy/display/use these prints is up to the owner. You would have to have a pretty big kitchen to frame and hang 16 prints. You could leave the portfolio on a coffee table (along with a pair of white cotton gloves). Or enjoy figuring out your own creative solution. If you think you might like to have one of the 15 remaining portfolios (discounting one each for María José, Ricardo and me) you can email me at maureenluciabooth(at)gmail.com.

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Mary Majerrison Came Back with Robert

Posted in Mary Majerrison Printmaker, Maureen Booths Studio, Maureens Printmaking Spain, Maureens printmaking workshops, printmaking Maureen Booth, Uncategorized, tagged Mary Majerrison Printmaker, Maureen Booth Printmaestra, Maureen's Printmaking Coaching, printmaking in Granada, printmaking in Spain on December 9, 2019| Leave a Comment »

Days Full of Printmaking, Seafood, White Wine and Laughs

When Mary was leaving after her first course with Maureen she said, “I want to come back here with my husband, Robert. So I’ll be seeing you again.” That was eight years ago, but Mary kept her word. In the meantime she has set up her own printmaking workshop at home in a small town outside Milan, Italy and she wanted to do a refresher course with her maestra before beginning serious work.

“I’m so glad I came back,” said Mary. “I learned so much making prints with Maureen this time. It was so fun working with gold leaf. I’ve got some at home but I never knew how to use it. This visit served to convinced me that I need to come back a third time and stay longer! And Robert doesn’t object. He had so much fun. He wants to come back to visit the great little seafood bar Mike and Maureen took us to and to eat another of Mike’s paellas on their terrace.”