Divining Triptychs: Printmaking, Dance, and Poetry Across Millennia

Printmaking, Dance, and Poetry convene in a visit across millennia with Hildegard von Bingen, St. Francis of Assisi, and Dante Alighieri.

The broadsides exhibit by Robert Woods is part of the PACES performance and collaboration and will remain in Coleman Hall for viewing through April 1, 2017. The exhibit features broadsides from Woods printing business Lines & Faces. Visit linesandfaces.com for more information about Woods’ work

PACES

PACES: dance and poetry fit to the space is the collaborative performance company of Dancer & Choreographer Lucinda Weaver and Poet and Storyteller Alan Bern. Bern and artist Robert Woods have worked together under the imprint of Lines & Faces for over forty years. All three come together in this one-of-a-kind performance “Divining Triptychs: Printmaking, Dance, and Poetry across Millennia.”

PACES collaborations begin from an idea of either Weaver’s dance or Bern’s words which then precipitate a creative dialogue. Recently they have begun working along parallel lines and then weaving these strands together to complete the arc of the piece. Their pieces are created together to fit the space they inhabit for their performance, be it a bookstore, library, park, stage, or — in the case of this performance at Gualala Arts Center — the floor of Coleman Hall which they will share with their audience. For 15 years PACES has performed all over California and in Italy and Switzerland.  Also featured in the Divining Triptychs performance is original music composed and recorded by local coast artists: saxophonist, Harrison Goldberg, and electric bassist, Dave Jordan, aka the duo “Pacific Woods,” from their newly released recording, “Pool of Mirrors.”

Just as Bern’s work evolves and intersects with Weaver’s dance through PACES, so it transforms with artist Robert Woods. The poet and artist have worked together under the imprint Lines & Faces for more than forty years. They are fine printers and artists who grew up in the 1960s together in Berkeley, and they collaborate to create works of art that allow the combining of word and image to express more than either artist can without the other.  Sometimes the work of one leads the other to create other works that coalesce to make a more powerful combination; other times they work simultaneously in parallel to create works together. They create broadsides which they plan, design, and print together on a Vandercook, an 80-year-old letterpress printing press used originally as a proving machine for the newspaper industry. They have also begun to use digital printing to produce their broadsides.

Gabriel Griffin, Poet and Director of Poetry on the Lake in Northern Italy, described a PACES performance: “At dusk…as the last light faded from the lake, Alan Bern and Lucinda Weaver gave a performance of dance and poetry in Piazza Motta: Alan read his poetry in both English and Italian.  In the soft lamplight and the shadows cast by the old arches and columns, Lucinda appeared ethereal in her white flowing garments. Verses echoed in the quiet square. Passers-by stopped to watch and listen, enchanted.”

A triptych is a piece of work divided into three panels. In this performance and exhibit, all three artists bring their work together, filling the space with dance, words, and art – Divining Triptychs.

Biographies:

Robert Woods trained as both a fine artist and craftsman at U.C. Santa Barbara and with a number of practicing artists: he is a sculptor, painter, and printmaker and is currently retired. Woods worked for over thirty years at Madison Street Press in Oakland, including managing the shop. He has used a variety of printmaking techniques including wood engraving, letterpress and etching. In addition to drawing and painting he also uses Adobe Illustrator to prepare blocks photomechanically, and he also engraves wood blocks by hand. Some of his Lines & Faces work has been imaged directly on archival material from those Adobe Illustrator files.

Alan Bern worked for over 15 years in the commercial printing industry. He became a librarian in 1992 and is now a Children’s Librarian at Berkeley Public Library.  He has worked in public libraries in the East Bay Area for 25 years in a variety of jobs. He is a poet and has two books published by Fithian Press:  No no the saddest (2004) and Waterwalking in Berkeley (2007). His third book, greater distance and other poems, with design and illustrations by Robert Woods, was released by Lines & Faces in 2015.   He is currently at work on a book based on the theme of Sacred Mountains, which grows out of his lifelong relationship with Italy.

Lucinda Weaver began dancing as a young child in Berkeley, California. Weaver danced with the Margaret Jenkins Dance Company after studying with David Wood at UC Berkeley and in New York City, then continued to the present as a solo performer/ choreographer, for many years living and performing in the Middle East and in Europe.

In 2000, Weaver was a guest artist with the Swiss dance company, Danza, performing at the Swiss Expo.  For the past several years, Weaver and Alan Bern have been performing as PACES both in America and Europe.  Their performance venues include bookstores, museums, libraries, cafes and piazzas along with more traditional spaces.

Weaver is on the faculty of Scuola Dimitri, a university for the performing arts in Switzerland, traveling there annually to teach and perform.  She is also a physical therapist.  She now lives in Gualala, California.

Tickets

Tickets are $15 Advance, youth 17 and under $10, both $5 more day of performance

For advance purchase, visit Brown Paper Tickets or call them at 1-800-838-3006.
To purchase in person, visit the Gualala Arts Center or Dolphin Gallery in Gualala.