Blue Heron Press

Blue Heron Press ~ Nebraska

Field Trip Poems by Twyla Hansen, Images by Karen Kunc. This multi segmented book moves through nature's profusion, desiccation, and human encroachment, ideas which were explored in a collaboration between the two artists. This project was made possible by the Artist in Residence program at the University of the Arts. A square formatted book 6 x 6 inches when folded, 94 inches when opened (and hung). Kunc's vibrant color lithographs are on one side of the panels and Hansen's poems are on the other. This is an ecological treatise printed from polymer relief plates onto Daphne fiber paper from Bhutan. The text is typeset at the Brady Press in Nebraska. Edition of 200. 2002. $65
Offering Time Songs by Rabindranath Tagore. Woodcuts by Karen Kunc. Tagore's own prose translations of his original Bengali songs (1913) speak with an inner voice that seeks both understanding and acceptance of one's place in the eternal cycle of time. Printed as a falling pathway of vibrant color, the images, both abstract and recognizable, flow into each other, creating a river of visual song that evokes the textual exuberance. The speaker of the poem is grounded in perception, moves seamlessly through action and experience, giving up and giving over to paradox: "Thy centuries follow each other perfecting a small wild flower. / We have no time to lose, and having no time we must scramble for our chances." Kunc draws upon visual impressions from her own travels in Bangladesh and from Tagore's images--the evolution of a flower, a maze of shadows and light, a red lotus, the winding path. Reduction woodcuts printed on Japanese Nishinouchi paper torn into an undulating vertical column (6.75 x 78 inches unfolded) that suggests a flowing river. Text is letterpress Romulus. Ten-page accordion fold forms a gentle curving parallelogram when closed (6.75 x 8 inches). Self-enclosing wrapper of delicate intaglio-printed dots and watercolor washes has small braided cord loop at top for hanging. Housed in a folio box covered with sharkskin paper (8.5 inches square). Structurally recalls Kunc's earlier book, Mexican Gothic. Edition of 50. A visual and poetic outpouring. $600
Blueprints Karen Kunc. An unusual addition to the body of Kunc's work, this book demonstrates the artist's accustomed graphic style, but moves the image representation toward further abstraction while anchoring the message through spare but purposeful text. The funnel pictured on the front cover suggests the self (or perhaps self/ego relationship), a large opening through which the onslaught of thought and experience can be channeled into a usable container. Kunc simulates, through her material, the construction of artistic and personal meanings that can lead to the inherent and expressed power of one's own voice. Symbols and text are overprinted onto screened images from drawings and appropriated mechanical and construction diagrams. Screen and letterpress printed with hand coloring on waxed, earth-colored, handmade paper from Bangladesh. The sensuous waxed surfaces of the papers are luminous and delicate, while the waxing makes the sheet more durable and translucent, adding to both the tactile quality of the work and the experience of reading. Handsewn pamphlet binding encased in a mottled-blue board folder with elastic closure that together suggest the transportable file. (7.25 x 8.35 inches; 20 pp.) $800

Truly Bone Poems by Hilda Raz. Etchings by Karen Kunc. Words of self-reflection and revelation about physical mortality and the search for meaning. Kunc, in her intriguing style, creates a rich, tactile frieze of images which pulse with biomorphic abstractions, geometric permutations, and natural icons. Hand printing processes integrate layers of color from aquatint washes, deeply bitten skeins of etched lines, and letterpress typography. The images are etching, spit-bite aquatint and drypoint from multiple copper plates using sixteen colors on Italian Alcantara cream paper. Romulus type. Accordion fold with paper covers is 7.5 inches square and unfolds to 150 inches. Signed edition of 50. $500 On this Land Poem by Lenora Castillo. Woodcuts by Karen Kunc. Both poet and artist share a sense of place, "from the center of nowhere and everywhere-Nebraska," On This Land reflects the austere beauty of farmland and open sky as it describes the gradual process of acceptance and attachment to a new place. Kunc's nature-inspired woodcuts echo the colors of rural harvesting, festivals, and folk arts. The spare poem, which runs along the bottom of the concertina pages, links the images together and forms a ground for Kunc's distinctive artwork. Each of the nine reduction woodcuts, with their layerings of color, were printed in five runs from two basswood blocks. The book unfolds to a dramatic horizontal spread that evokes the land itself. Printed for the National Museum of Women in the Arts on Nideggen paper with handmade, red flax cover paper stained with walnut. Book block tipped-in at front. Signed edition of 125. (7.5 x 5 inches opens to 102 inches.) Last Copy. $200 We also carry the following editions of Karen Kunc's visual artists' books. All are in a small format and have a landscape orientation: O& From the colophon: "Woven wattle, wheat waves, hay rolls, fence rows, mangers, chutes -- malleable, entwined, shaped, sequenced permutations of shifting screens -- herein the true rococo of my mind, memory and Impatient Hand draws origin and symbol further." Relief and intaglio woodcuts on handmade Roma paper (dark red-brown). Varied page shapes support the visual/tactile journey. Edition of 20. 1991. $500 Sketchbook From the colophon: "Sketching, testing ideas long held and discovering new -- watermarking handmade paper; superimposed overlays of woodblock printing; actual-scale drawings from letterpress engravings; hand embellishments and binding; pages of new history from old prints -- a stream of order -- entangled, surprising, incongruous -- a source book." Printed on Japanese paper in bright and deep color overlays. Edition of 18. 1990. $500 Sheer Distance Hand-marbled pages in which the center has been kept free of color. Brightly colored woodblock prints illustrate these windows. Housed in a paper wrapper. Edition of 24. 1983. $350

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