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Barack Obama Woodblock Prints by Tom Kristensen
From January 18th until January 21 runs our auction number 701 - a solo auction of woodblock prints by Tom Kristensen from Australia. Highlight of the auction are two new designs by Tom showing Barack Obama, the 44th President of the United States of America.
Auction No. 701 - Hope
Tom Kristensen's prints have always had a slight political and ecological touch. I remember how I proposed to him several years ago to try a series of American presidents. I thought of names like George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, John F. Kennedy. But Tom misunderstood me and was replying how he should find peace of his mind by making a portrait of George W. Bush.
Tom Kristensen does not make any compromises on major issues. The two portraits by Barack Obama will certainly not contradict with his convictions. For both designs Tom has tried a new style. These two works go deeper into the woodgrain and texture and exploit more the capabilities of the woodblock technique. Kiyoshi Saito was the first artist to introduce this kind of style. And he was very successful, and today his works are in demand for high prices. Fortunately Tom's prints are (still) very affordable.
Tom explained to me that not many artists had followed Kiyoshi Saito's new style - simply because it was not easy to accomplish.
I hope I am not betraying a secret. But if the two releases in "woodgrain and texture style" will be succesful, Tom might release also a color version of the Barack Obama design - for guys like me with a bad taste for gaudy colors - (just kidding).
About Tom Kristensen
My first encounter with Tom Kristensen was as a collector of Japanese prints and client of artelino. I did not know anything of his second life as a printmaker until he came out of the closet one day. It was in springtime of 2005 when his works were available in an artelino auction for the first time.
Kristensen is a self-trained woodblock printmaker. And he did rather well in his first auction. Since then we have sold more than 400 of his prints.
Tom uses only Japanese tools, materials and techniques. He learned everything on the Internet and to my knowledge he orders the materials and tools on the Internet. He is not the only non-Japanese to practice the Japanese style of making woodblock prints. There is a worldwide art movement and it even has a name. It is called moku hanga - 'moku' is the Japanese word for 'woodblock' and 'hanga' for 'print".
My Personal Experience with the USA.
My first encounter with Americans started rather dramatic in 1948. I know the story only from my mother. I was a few months old when a US military jeep in occupied Germany pushed back and unintentionally ran over my mom's baby carriage with me inside. The buggy was completely demolished, but I fell out and remained unharmed under the jeep. Military police came, documented the accident and my mom received excuses and compensation for a new buggy. Imagine, they handled this accident a hundred percent correct only three years after the world had learned about the full scale of the atrocities of Nazi Germany! Not a matter of course in this world, not in 1948 nor in our days!
Later during the 1960s as a young boy I was strongly influenced by American culture and learned English at school and by listening to AFN (American Forces Network) for the latest American and British pop songs. And I admired a nation so great that it was capable to land three men on the moon. And even more impressive was how you guys got the three astronauts of the ill-fated Apollo 13 mission back to earth safe and sound, against all odds and under desperate circumstances.
But it took until 1994 that I set my foot for the first time on US ground as a tourist, attending a business language school In Alexandria, VA. Later I got to know Yorie in the USA and had a reason to shuttle frequently between the old and the new continent. I have experienced the people in the U.S.A. as very friendly and polite.
Somehow I think that "American values" is more than a buzzword. Eight years of Bush administration however have made it difficult for an European to show a high profile pro-American attitude. But I have never removed the American flag that decorates my desk. I hope with President Barack Obama the American flag on my desk will again fill me with pride (I got it when attending Yorie's swearing-in ceremony when she became an American citizen).
May God bless the new President and his team. May God bless the United States of America.
Dieter Wanczura
(January 2009)
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