Bill Ritchie's art
in the
Carl Chew Collection
"Isn't it funny how people who love each other don't say much to each other?" - John Cage, paraphrased from Ritchie's video of his press conference in 1983 in Cologne. I realized after 38 years knowing C. T. Chew and counting him as a best friend, it took me a long time before I put his name among my art patrons' pages on my website. His collection of my work is a big collection. He owns my single most important painting, below, and much more. - BR
Painting measures 48 X 83 inches. Reproductions are available, click here.
Last Voyage of the Emeralda
Provenance: Painting. pa060520rit. Acrylic on canvas-mounted hardboard. Acrylic. Yellow, violet, red, cinnabar, white and other colors. Image 48" x 83" on canvas over board. Signed lower right with stamp.
Comment: A fine furniture designer commissioned me to do a speculation painting. It was an opportunity to show the tragic ending of my fantasy Emeralda being destroyed by a tsunami. The commissioners could not buy it so the painting came back to us. Years later, Carl Chew purchased it and on this occasion I made an Owner's 'Zine in which I documented my making of the painting and the back stories for it.
"Last Voyage of the Emeralda," an Owner's Manual online as PDF.
The Dreamer
Provenance: 1988. Screen print, 3 colors. Black, green (inks number more as sheens vary). Image 17 X 25 1/4 in on 22 X 30 in Arches 88. Signed lower right. Collections of over 50 members of CD/I Publisher's Club individuals, museums and corporations and Artist's Family.
Comment: "I selected two images that showcased my use of computer graphics in their creation, and added them to C. T. Chew's brainchild--a four print portfolio of our work to finance the CD/I project launch. The Dreamer came from 36 Views of the Locus of Beauty. Mike Peterson printed this one and gave me the shiny-black-on--dull-black I wanted to make the otherwise static image 'live' as I move around the print. The acid green is from the first CRT displays that came with my first Apple II computer.
Lunar Concerns
Provenance: 1988. Screen print. Eight colors: Black, silver, yellow-green, red, green and interference sheen colors. Image 17 X 25 in. on 22 X 30 Arches' 88. Signed lower right. Collections of fifty members of the CD/I Publisher's Club and the Artist's family & Fine Print Studios.
Comment: "C. T. Chew conceived a plan to finance our joint venture into CD-based publishing. Art Student was our vision, a disk to contain 'everything an art student needs'. We contacted our patrons, friends and corporations. We raised the money we needed to buy equipment and research materials, tuition and some living expenses. Lunar Concerns started out as an Apple II dot-matrix print, and went through several metamorphoses. I have shown these prints numerous times and they have given me many rewarding experiences and developed relationships nationally."
(Placeholder - this is not Carl's print)
"Locus and Sea Squares "
Provenance: Print. Impression number unknown, one of a variable edition of 141. Printed with intaglio inks from a lacquered copper plate.
Comment: This print is from a series of 141 trial proofs and artist's proofs in "cycles" of approximately 15 each, of different color series. They are proofs which I made in the processes of cyanotype, woodcut, and intaglio techniques. The result is a series of monotypes. The images derive from three sources: The map is based on the Colorado River, a vicinity known once as the Crossing of the Fathers; the leaf-like shape I call locus--the path of a moving point (I drew these to help establish data for use in a computer program). The Great Wave was drawn to resemble the famous print by Hokusai. Besides the pleasure of meeting people who want to take this print into their personal collections, I have shown the print numerous times and it has given me many rewards, nationally & regionally.
Click here to see the process of Bill printing this print
and the printed transcript by selecting: Transcript
Little Spaceship Crash
Provenance: 1977. Print. Intaglio, relief, stencil, litho. Ochre, red, blue, black, gray.
Image 12 X 9 in on 15 X 11 3/4 in Van Gelder Zonen (natural, buff) paper.
No. 2/25/77 Artist's Proof. Signed lower right. Inscribed "To Nellie" as it was part of the artist's two daughters' collections.
Comment: Spanning two years of development and about 75 impressions, Little Spaceship Crash was the seed for a larger work. These came out of the movie, Planet of the Apes. I like to tell the story about the path flown by the helicopter filming it, and then my entry into computers graphics and how I learned the X-Y-Z of IT. This print was test of methods I would need for a larger version, then the tests resulted in an edition that stood on its own.
Private collections: Evonne Agnello, Karl Beckley, Billie Jane Bryan, Zena Chew, Larry Dillon, Linda Farris Estate, Alfred Harrison, Kim & Carol Hoffman, Eric Hoffman, Ross Jones Estate, Keith Kirkpatrick, David Lonay, Dennis Evans & Nancy Mee, Anne Middleton, Walter Parsons, Maury Pepin Estate, Donna Pope, Ed & Anne Praczukowski, James "Bud" Richardson, Lynda Ritchie, Carol Fuller- Schwab, Lori Shepard, Keith Beckley & Presha Sparling, Peggy Vanbianchi, and Carolyn Law & Andy Weisbecker
Institutions and corporate collections: Art Planning Consultants, New York, NY; Landau/Alexander Gallery, Los Angeles CA;Oregon Arts Commission; Bill Mally Collection, University of Washington IMS, Seattle, WA; Norton Building, Seattle, WA; Teller Training Institute, Seattle, WA; United Pacific Reliance Corporation, CA; USIA Tokyo, Japan.
Exhibitions: Anne Hughes Gallery, Portland, OR; Davidson Galleries, Seattle, WA; DeCordova Museum, Lincoln, MA; Impressions Gallery, Boston, MA; Kiku Gallery, Seattle, WA; Silvermine Guild of Arts, New Canaan, CT; US Information Agency, Tokyo Japan; Visual Arts Center, Anchorage, AK
(Placeholder - actual image of Carl's print unavailable)
Little C-Square
Provenance: 1977. Print. Intaglio & woodcut. Black, ochre, blue, orange. Smith & Weber intaglio ink and watercolor on Japanese papers chine colle'd on Van Gelder Zonen. 6 3/4 X 5 in. on 12 X 9 in. Number unavailable. Signed lower right. Other owners include Gretchen Davidson, Kathy Rabel, Lee Stubbe, Joan Stuart Ross, Brett and Marivic Weathers and the Ritchie family.
Comment: The C-squares series used the architect and engineer's instrument, warped, bent and twisted. Nineteen seventy-seven was the year of the Great Wave Square at Seattle's art festival, Bumbershoot, and other works on this theme. Sosaku-hanga is similar to watercolor and I could have a variety of colors in the foreground (bottom) area of the print. No two are alike - but almost. The bent 'C' form of the C-square is debossed. I used a pierced, cut-out area in the thin copper that I used for the etching and a ribbon of wood veneer carried the ochre.
Unassembled, left and finished, right
WeeWoodie Rembrandt Press (sold)
Specifications: 20-piece do-it-yourself kit for a working scale model of a 17th Century etching press like one used by Rembrandt and other old masters of printmaking arts. Winner of a Silver Award in the A'Design Competition in Milan, Italy, 2013.
Comment: Carl bought a Wee Woodie Rembrandt Press in 2018 and two years later donated it to Sabrina Gruenauer, an art instructor in Munich for her to use in her class for the topic of Art Games and Toys.
Click here to see
PRINTING ON A WEE WOODIE REMBRANDT PRESS II
Click here to see
ASSEMBLING THE WEE WOODIE REMBRANDT PRESS
For the WeeWoodie Rembrandt Press videography, click HERE.
See the Patron's List for more peoples' collections - click here