This last Friday, a handful of printmaking students and I went to Pittsburgh to visit the Warhol Museum, Tugboat Printshop, and Artists Image Resource.
It was a great (and long) day filled with some really amazing art and a lot of fun! It all started at the Warhol Museum and the exhibition “Regarding Warhol: Sixty Artists, Fifty Years“. The show was amazing, it was like a contemporary art history class in the museum. We saw seminal works by John Baldassari, Hans Haacke, and Ed Ruscha just to name a few. Personally, Cory Arcangel’s “Super Mario Clouds” had a positive effect on my own ideas about my work, but I won’t get into that now. We also got to see one of our own printmakers, Brianna Saddler, working as an education intern there.
After the Warhol we had dinner at Max’s (of course) then we made our way to Tugboat Printshop to visit their open house.
Many thanks to Paul and Valerie for taking some time out of their day to talk to us and answer our questions. It was really great to see how they have their shop set up, and we got to see a lot of their blocks and possibly some trade secrets?
Then to top the night off, we went to AIR to see the “Confluence” show. Our MFA students (John Baker, Vlad Basarab, Ryan Brislawn, Mike Loop, Morgan Milders, Sarah Olsen, Meghan Olson, Kofi Opoku, Erica Passage, Lauren Shiefelbein, Silas Spellman, Kristine Synowka, Ashley Teets, and Xia Zhang) organized a group exhibition along side the two WVU student interns for 2012 Chris Tingely and Nate Snyder. It was a well attended closing reception, and the shows looked great. Everyone put a lot of time and effort into making this a successful event, and it paid off. This Spring exhibition has become an annual tradition for our program, and we appreciate AIR working with us to let this happen.
Ground floor gallery with Chris and Nate’s work.
WVU Undergrad Chris Tingley with a collaborative silkscreen made with Nate Snyder.
The Pittsburgh Taco Truck!!!!
Sarah Olsen ceramics and paintings…
Morgan Milders flamingo sculptures, Meghan Olsen on the right and Ashlet Teets paintings on the left…
Vlad Basarab projection from his recent MFA Thesis Exhibition…
Mike Loop wall sculptures…
Erica Passage ceramics…
Mixed media works by Silas Spellman…
Room sized sculpture by Xia Zhang…
Kofi Opoku work from his recent MFA Thesis Exhibition…
WVU undergrad Nate Snyder’s band playing the reception…
Hey, I know those guys! Its always a treat to see former students…on the right is alum and ceramics dynamo Kyle McGlothlin and former printmaker and AIR Intern Kasey Kessner….
Joseph Lupo 
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