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[mathhombre]

Langston Hughes, The First Book of Rhythm, Illustration by Robin King, Franklin Watts, New York, NY, 1954, pp. 6-7

Had to collect more of these in one place. First seen at @garadinervi. 

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/5974919-the-first-book-of-rhythms

[danewsea]

daTrue

[jaubaius]

Please Go Away (Flamenco Edit)💃🏻🎺🎸😻

Source

[fravery]

[nevver]

NASA

[kittens-jpg]

sandwich kitty

[picklessantana-blog]

by Stephen Mackey

[uwmspeccoll]

Wood Engraving Wednesday

DALE DEARMOND

Alaskan artist, librarian, and wood engraver Dale DeArmond (1914-2006) illustrated indigenous Alaskan stories and folktales for over half a century. In an interview she observed, “I’m an illustrator. And I prefer to illustrate myths and legends. Mostly myths and legends of the Native Alaskan people, and other things that relate to Alaska because I’ve been up here so long, that’s all I know about…” DeArmond was born in North Dakota, educated in Tacoma, Washington, and then moved to Alaska after marrying Robert Neil DeArmond, a native of Sitka, where she remained for the rest of her life.  

DeArmond began her artistic career as a painter, but in 1959 she trained with painter and woodcut artist Danny Pierce, a long-time Art professor here at UW-Milwaukee who spent much time in Alaska, and her career was transformed as a woodcut artist. She spoke about this experience in several interviews:

A friend and I spent the whole day watching Danny do a woodcut and print it. We could hardly wait until the next day to go to the builder’s supply and get the materials… . Danny Pierce’s demonstration made everything seem so simple… . The joyful thing about woodcuts is that even your first efforts look good… . I was a painter and illustrator in 1960 when I did my first woodcut and I have been having a love affair with wood ever since.  

Then, after taking a wood engraving class in 1978, her career was transformed again, producing hundreds of wood-engraved prints and illustrations until the onset of dementia put an end to her career in 1999. By then, she had become a very notable figure in Alaskan cultural life. When asked about this notoriety, she responded, “Well, it’s easy to be famous in Alaska!”   

The work shown here, some of the last of DeArmond’s long career, are wood engravings for the 1995 publication Tales from the Dena, Indian Stories from the Tanana, Koyukuk, & Yukon Rivers, published by the University of Washington Press. The collection includes 41 Alaskan Indian tales, originally transcribed in 1935 by Frederica de Laguna and Norman Reynolds during an archaeological survey of the middle and lower Yukon River valley. de Laguna writes: 

To my delight, Dale DeArmond, who has illustrated so many Alaskan stories, expressed an interest in illustrating these [stories]… . With this collaboration, I knew that we should offer this book to the general public … . Not least among those who I hope will find enjoyment in the book are the children and grandchildren of out storytellers, who told us the Tales from the Dena so long ago.

Dale DeArmond and I have asked that twenty percent of the royalties … go to the Doyon Foundation, a Native organization in Fairbanks, Alaska, to be used for the benefit of the Dena children and young people.

Click on the images to see the captions.

View more posts with wood engravings!

[nocternalrandomness]

“To all the Veterans”