Will Petersen

A Matter of Aesthetics

With chopmarks and blindstamps. published by The Lakeside Studio (chopmark lower right). THE LITHOGRAPH IS SIGNED TITLED AND ANNOTATED BY THE ARTIST in pencil EXCELLENT condition. Will's formal art education began with classes at the Chicago Academy of Fine Arts. As a student at the city's Steinmetz High School, Petersen succeeded Hugh Hefner (of Playboy magazine fame) as the HS newspaper cartoonist, the Steinmetz Star. During this time, Petersen recovered from polio. In 1947 Petersen enrolled at Chicago's Wilbur Wright College. While there, he painted with oils for the first time. Two years later he enrolled at Michigan State University where he developed a strong interest in literature and writing and began printmaking. By 1951 he had begun to exhibit paintings and prints nationally. A year later he completed his master's degree. Petersen served in the United States Army from 1952-54, spending one year as an education specialist in Japan. This encounter with the Japanese culture affected his entire life. He became interested in calligraphy and Noh, classical Japanese Buddhist performance that combines elements of drama, music and poetry. Upon completion of his military service in Japan in 1955, Will Petersen settled in Oakland, California, where he met some of the most active poets of the Beat Generation: Gary Snyder, Allen Ginsberg, Jack Kerouac, Phil Whalen, Mike McClure and others. Petersen was attracted to the group by their intelligence and belief in Zen Buddhism. In 1956 in his small studio in Oakland, he printed the poems of Jack Kerouac. He attended for the first time, the reading of Ginsberg's Howl at Six Gallery. His relationship with Gary Snyder had begun when both were in Kyoto, Japan; later Snyder wrote for the Plucked Chicken. Petersen returned to Japan in 1957, pursuing painting, printmaking and writing for eight years while living in Kyoto. In 1965 he accepted a faculty appointment at Ohio State University, teaching drawing, painting and printmaking. Four years later Petersen took his teaching skills to West Virginia University in Morgantown, where he concentrated on printmaking. He taught there until 1977 when he began publishing Plucked Chicken, a journal of art and poetry. In 1978 in Morgantown, Petersen and his wife, Cynthia Archer, established Plucked Chicken Press, which they later moved to Chicago and then Evanston. Petersen operated the Press until his death on April 1, 1994. 1956 In storefront studio in Oakland, California, creates serigraphs and lithographs. Prints poems of Jack Kerouac. 1961 Back in Japan, acquires a lithography press and stones and resumes printing lithographs. Exhibits regularly with Kyoto Printmakers. 1969 Resident lithographer at the Lakeside Studio, Lakeside, Michigan. Prints for the first time Richard Hunt lithographs. 1978 Establishes Plucked Chicken Press in Morgantown, West Virginia. Resident lithographer at Lakeside Studio in Michigan. 1980 Plucked Chicken Press moves to Chicago. Publishes lithographs by Don Crouch and Art Kleinman. 1982 Publishes Blossom, a lithograph/collage by Tom Nakashima. 1983 Series I of Plucked Chicken Press is published with work by Archer, Duckworth, Godfrey, Heagstedt, Himmelfarb, Hoff, Hunt, Martyl, Miller, Nakashima and Petersen. 1984 Plucked Chicken Press moves to Evanston. Series II of Plucked Chicken Press is published with works by Croydon, Ho, Archer, Torn, Osver, Middaugh, Roseberry, Petersen, Spiess-Ferris and Hoppock. 1985 Series III of Plucked Chicken Press is published with works by Driesbach, Hunt, Trupp, Gregor, Pattison, Conger, Evans, Weygandt, Archer, Ho and Petersen. Prints Suite I, Northern Illinois University Collectors Series, with lithographs by Renie Adams, David Bower, David Driesbach, Carl Hayano and Ben Mahmoud...

SCARCE EARLY WORK. BEN SHAHN Levana and our Lady's Sorrows. lithograph printed in sepia on Papier Ancien, 1931. 13 1/8x9 7/8 inches (sheets), full margins, loose as issued. One of o...