Barbara Takenaga

Small Springs (backsplash)

2019

Color lithograph, Edition 30. Barbara Takenaga is a painter who made her first lithograph at Shark’s in the summer of 2002. Her abstract works are full of repeated, obsessive mark...

Color monotype. Barbara Takenaga's latest prints are a series of Untitled hand colored monotypes, which she describes as follows: Making these monotypes was a wonderful new experience for me. They combine a painterly, abstract background with a graphic structure of hard edged, flat forms. Those dark shapes can be read as either positive/foreground space (body silhouettes or curtains) or as negative space that frames a central image (landscapes, columns, creatures). Similarly, the white lines and dots...

Barbara Takenaga has had fun embellishing the last prints in the editions – Switchback State I and State II from 2011 – with extensive hand coloring. She has inverted and rearranged ...

Color lithograph with gold metallic powder, Edition 15. Barbara Takenaga writes: “About the prints, they’re part of a series of recent Angel paintings — which were influenced by seeing a small painting fragment of angel’s wings by Fra Angelico. I liked the way the feather pattern is similar to the Asian motif of fish scales or waves of water. There is a reference to the natural world, as well as the heavenly, but in an abstract, decorative approach. With the scale change of smaller elements in the center and larger dots on the edge, there is the implication of folded space that moves from near to distant — with some sensation of being pulled toward a far off place. The metallic background is dusted with gold or pearlescent powder over deep orange, which gives the surface some shimmer and color change. The title, Angel (Little Egypt), comes from the colors that are reminiscent of ancient Egyptian collars...

This 17-color screenprint was created by the artist in 1997. Signed in pencil and numbered, from the edition of 75 measuring.

This 17-color screenprint was created by the artist in 1997. Signed in pencil and numbered, from the edition of 75 measuring.

17-color silkscreen

Shahzia Sikander received her BFA from the National College of Arts, Lahore, Pakistan and her MFA from the Rhode Island School of Design. Pakistani-born and internationally recognized, Sikander’s pioneering practice takes Indo-Persian miniature painting...