The educational goal of the printmaking department is to provide students with the technical and aesthetic instruction necessary to develop as artists, primarily based in printmaking, with a distinctive vision and a professional approach to their work. Printmaking is an extension of drawing; thus, drawing and compositional skills are developed along with those of printmaking. Students learn the basics of the major printmaking techniques and must achieve mastery in lithography and etching. Black and white and color processes are taught in all media within the program. Students are also encouraged to pursue other areas of the printmaking curriculum, such as relief, monotype and book arts.
Aesthetic understanding is developed through studio projects, which lead to more self-directed work on the upper levels, through lectures and demonstrations, and in workshops with well-known visiting artists and printmakers, including Carmon Colangelo, Karen Kunc and Nona Hershey. The printmaking department has hosted Walton Ford and Steven Sorman as its Auerbach lecturers during the past several years.
The students’ work leads to their senior exhibition and helps prepare them for graduate school or a career in printmaking and the arts, whether it be as a gallery artist or in some fine arts printing capacity, teaching or other fields within the greater art community.
The printmaking department is housed in Taub Hall and offers spacious, well-lit studios with full facilities for the production of lithographs, etchings, all modes of relief printing, book arts, monotype, and photo-process printing. The area is fully ventilated and includes the following presses: three etching, three lithography, three Vandercook proof presses for letterpress, and two flat-bed offset presses. The facilities also include a photo-process darkroom containing a photo-plate exposure unit, and a digital process lab with Apple Macintosh computers, large-format scanner, and an EPSON Pro 7600 printer, capable of printing up to 24 inches wide.