Brian Fisher Print, Paint and Sculpture Blog

"Gilgamesh," mixed media rust print on vintage linen, Brian Fisher The Epic of Gilgamesh, regarded as the earliest surviving great work of literature,  is an ancient Sumerian poem describing the life and ambitions of Gilgamesh the demigod, hero and king of the Sumerian city-state of Uruk. The story first describes Gilgamesh as larger than life, beautiful to behold, with an expansive imagination and passions.  He’s the epitome of the civilized man.  He’s a builder, a dreamer but as it turns out, he’s also a despot. His abused and oppressed subjects pray to the gods for deliverance.  The gods respond by creating an opposite, a match, for Gilgamesh.  His name is Enkidu. He’s a natural, a wild man who's friends are the beasts of the wild.  They brawl when they meet but learn quickly to respect each other. It’s a twenty-seventh century B.C.E. bromance. With Enkidu’s tempering influence the great city of Uruk is finally ruled by a just and wise King.  G...

"Hades Takes A Wife"  Rust print on vintage linen over panel, 36 x 28 in. "Hades Takes A Wife" depicts the abduction of Persephone by Hades; the first act in the Greek foundation myth explaining the cycles of nature and symbolizing the cycle of life and rebirth. Hades ruled the Underworld alone and desired a Queen to rule with him.  He fell in love with Persephone but knew Persephone’s mother Demeter, goddess of harvest and fertility, would never consent to his proposal.  So, Hades appealed to a higher power, his brother Zeus (Persephone’s Father) who agreed to the union but foresaw Demeter’s objections. Together they decided Hades would steal Persephone from her mother. One day while Persephone picked meadow flowers a cavern opened at her feet and Hades took her down, down to his Underworld Kingdom.  Demeter frantically searched the world for her lost daughter but of course she was no longer of the world.  Eventually she discovered what had really happened...

"The Temple of Forgetting" Rust Print on linen over panel, 41 x 33 in. Lethe’s Temple, "The Temple of Forgetting", has its foundations in a river.  In early Greek myth, Lethe was one of five rivers that flowed through the subterranean Kingdom of Hades.  Souls who passed into Hades had need to forget the suffering they had endured, or perhaps, the torment they had inflicted.  So, if a soul were ever to achieve peace, the dead would drink from its water in order to forget their earthly life and the river Lethe would wash away the memory of physical reality. Myths evolve and Lethe the river was eventually personified as Goddess.  Lethe the Goddess became synonymous with forgetting.  Lethe is the root word of lethargy meaning weariness, lassitude, and fatigue. Please view “The Temple of Lethe”, a Rust Print Assemblage, at my studio, stop #5, on the  2017 Vashon Island Holiday Studio Tour , December 2-3 & 9-10 (Saturdays and Sundays) 10am to 4pm. ...

My Monotype Print "Animal Parade" with several other animal themed rust prints and collographs  are currently part of the Vashon Heron's Nest exhibit "Coyotes, Cougars and Bears, Oh My!" You may love or fear the wild but you have to deal with it when you have chosen to live on Vashon.   This mercurial subject is explored this September by Margaret Tylczak, Paula Allegrina and Brian Fisher at the Heron's Nest Gallery, 17600 Vashon Hwy SW Vashon Island, WA.

I’m a bit obsessed with all things Labyrinth.  The Minotaur and the Labyrinths' physical geometry have been elements of personal curiosity and visual exploration for many years.  I am not sure why this particular Hero's Journey appeals to me but I return to it over and again.  Jorge Luis Borges’s short story “La casa de Asterión” is a compelling contemporary and sympathetic take on this ancient story.  The tittle of my Rust Monotype “Monster” references Asterion, the Minotaur,  as  Borges describes him, “a prisoner of his own loneliness, his otherness, his condition of monster”. “Monster” will be exhibited in the 2017 Expressions Northwest at Northwind Arts Center, 701 Water Street, Port Townsend, Wa.  The exhibit opens 11:30 August 3rd and closes at 5:30 on August 27.  The Exhibition’s junior, Susan Warner will speak on August 5 during Port Townsend's Art Walk Evening.

Daniel Mendelsohn wrote, “The writers we absorb when we’re young bind us to them, sometimes lightly, sometimes with iron. In time, the bonds fall away, but if you look very closely you can sometimes make out the pale white groove of a faded scar, or the telltale chalky red of old rust.”  He was describing how Mary Renault’s books and her correspondence with him had influenced his life.  He could also have been describing the physical scars of a survivor of lightening strike. I first read “Fire from Heaven,” and the “The Persian Boy” when I was 15 and Renault cast a literally spell over how I viewed my adolescent world.   In many ways the characters and places she described continue to influence how I filter circumstance and the art I create. The biblical interpretation of  “Fire from Heaven” is about sacrifice, (burnt offerings) and retribution.  When I created my rust Monotype “Fire from Heaven” shortly after Trump won enough Electoral votes to qualify...

Horizon and sky are the most memorable characteristics of the midwestern landscape I was born to.   I suspect the knowledge my father shared with me and with my siblings, lying on our backs in the buffalo grass of our grandparent’s Kansas farm and gazing up through night binoculars, predated his studies at Denver University, Colorado and Hays College, Kansas in the 1950’s and 60’s.   Wherever, whenever, his knowledge came from, his passion for stargazing is memorable and has inspired my Rust Monotype “Cygnus”. My Father, Dale Fisher, was born April 20, 1913 into a world of kerosene and candles, well before manmade light and the Rural Electrification Act of 1936 dimmed his world to the heavens. My dad’s perspective about sky included a classical explanation of the constellations, lay observation of the stars/planets and an avid curiosity about the physical world that caused him to call his family outside to witness sputnik traversing the night sky. His is the voic...

The Gemini, Rust Mono Print, Vintage Linen mounted to Panel, 11x11 in. Gemini is one of the brighter constellations of the Zodiac. I n the Northern Hemisphere, it lights up the early evening sky from January until May. The constellation is said to represent the twins of Greek myth Castor and Polydeuces. These brothers are also known as the Dioskouroi or Dioscuri, meaning “sons of Zeus.”  In Latin they are called the Gemini. Myths differ but in the best known story of their parentage and birth, their mother Leda, a Queen of Sparta, was seduced by a swan that turned out to be Zeus.  Amorous Leda soon thereafter also conceived by her husband Tyndareus and gave birth to an egg or eggs that contained the male twins Castor and Polydeuces and female twins Helen and Clytemnestra.  These siblings play significant roles in the many myths that describe the Trojan War, Jason’s quest for the Golden Fleece and even the Theseus myth. Castor and Polyd...

Outside / In Fisher Studio     Night Cometh!   Our season of sun and long hours to work and to play in is fading.   Where did the Summer go ?   I am very thankful for the long hot August days I’ve had to “Rust Print” in and appreciative now of Puget Power and Light to extend the workday beyond the Biblically allotted 12 hours of light!  And I’m taking full advantage of all the light-emitting diodes in my new studio to complete what I have started in Summer light! Inside / Out  Fisher Studio

"Hylas, Lost to Love" Rust Monoprint, 14x14 in. I just returned from Edmonds, WA and the Unclad 2016 Exhibition.  After a hiatus of several years, art director and promoter Gale Picken ( 66 Events ) recreated and moved her themed show from Stanwood, WA to the Edmonds, WA Yacht club.  I was delighted to once again exhibit in this venue and with 90 wonderful artists from across North America.  Unclad 2016

I'm currently exhibiting work at Plymouth Church in Seattle.  Above is "The Mill of Time," a Rust Monottype with Gold Leaf, 30x30 in.  And below is "Vortex of the Eternal Now," also a Rust Monotype with Gold Leaf and with the same dimensions. "The Mill of Time" and "Vortex of the Eternal Now" celebrate with process and image the mystery of Time.  Measurable but elastic, time is experienced only in the present but is anticipated as future and remembered as past!  

Kouros, 30x30 in., Rust Monotype on panel with gold leaf Roby King Galleries In Winslow on Bainbridge Island, Washington, hosts a Printmaking Exhibition this month.  The opening reception is October 3 at 6 PM.  My rust Monotype Kouros (youth), above, and companion print Kore (maiden) will be exhibited. Kouros and Kore were inspired by sculpture of archaic Greece (800 BC – 480 BC).  The Kouroi and Korai sculptures of Greece did not represent an individual but the idea and ideal of youth, a combination of moral and physical beauty and nobility.

Gnosis, Rust Monotype, 30x30 in. ArtXchange Gallery’s new exhibit, Mandala: Contemporary Interpretations of the Ancient Form (Opening July 3, 5-8pm, thru August 9, 2014) features nine artists (Nola Avienne, Sarah Barrick, Eric Carson, Brian Fisher, Carl Gombert, Terra Holcomb, Chris Moench, C. Andrew Rohrmann and Connie Sabo), whose work explores the structure or theme of Mandala, the Hindu and Buddhist representation of the Universe. Mandalas, commonly seen as circular forms or a square within a circle, are a microcosm of existence, a meditative tool, and a Jungian symbol representing the effort to reunify the self. Above is my Rust Monotype Gnosis, one of several related rust images I will be exhibiting. ArtXchange is located at 512 1st Ave S, Seattle, WA 98104. Hours are 11:30-5:30 Tuesday-Saturday.

In October of 2012 Tim Timmerman, director of the Minthorne Gallery at George Fox University , invited me to exhibit my work.  What a wonderful opportunity! I've been thinking and making art for this exhibit ever since. I was at that time working on "Journey" as theme and rust as medium and the work made for this exhibition continues my exploration of the hero's journey in Monotype Print, Rust Print and Sculpture in steel and wood.  The circle is a reoccurring element in many of these new images.  It is for me symbolic of the hero's quest for balance in his exploration of the creative, spiritual and cultural impulses of humankind.  Nine of these rust images were made  by using an open steel plate and acetate stencils; a variation on the water-jet cut steel plates I typically print from. The image at left, "Kentro" (The Center), is a Rust Print, 30 x 30 in.  The image below, "Kore" is a Rust Print, 30 x 30 in. I am inspired by the...

Petros, "The Stone," Rust Print, 30 x 30 in. Heroes Before Us is the tittle of my solo exhibition of prints and sculptures opening Jan 23 - Feb. 20, 2014 at George Fox University's Minthorne Gallery in Newberg, Oregon. The imagery I have made for this exhibit references Classical Western Myth and the mythic stories that I believe tell us the truth about ourselves. These images are portraits of the hero's quest for balance that is a fusion of the creative, spiritual and cultural impulses of humankind. Divining Center, Monotype Print (1/1), 35.5 x 14.75 in.

I have continued to explore rust as a medium this summer and early fall.  My "Man at Center" Rust Monotype, 30" x 30" in., mounted to wood panel, was made with an open Corten steel plate and acetate stencil.  Below is am image of the plate after the print was pulled.

Dear friends, family and all of you that found your way to my studio for the first time on the Vashon Island 2012 Holiday Studio Tour, Thank You!  I always enjoy seeing everyone and this year so many new people found their way to my studio door.  Aki, our Shiba Inu, spends a lot of creative time with me.  This year she was the official, sometimes vocal, greeter of guests during the tour.  Typical of the breed, she has opinions about everything and everyone.  I know she enjoyed the tour as much as I did and is missing the attention.  Thanks so much and come again!

Weekend two of the Vashon Holiday Studio Tour promises to be a little drier.  We had a great first weekend in spite of the rain.  Thank you friends and patrons for stopping in to see what was new.  I had many questions about my new Rust Prints and rust process.  The photo below features a few of those.

Cabeiri Rites, Rust Print, 24 x 24 in. December 1-2 and 8-9 from 10am to 4 pm the artists of Vashon Island open their studio doors to share art and process with friends and patrons.  This year I am studio number 9 on the tour.  I always look forward to this event.  Here is a link to the Vashon Island Art Studio Tour Holiday 2012 lineup of studios. Cabeiri Rites is one of many new rust prints I will be showing for sale in addition to my other print, paint and assemblage work.

Vashon Allied Arts’s monthly publication Island Arts selected my Rust Print, Triton , for the November cover and to represent our Journey exhibit currently at the Blue Heron Gallery! Triton, herald and son of Poseidon calmed storms and frightened the immortals when he blew upon the conch shell that was his symbol.   When the Argonauts found themselves lost in the deserts of Libya, blown inland by storm, Triton in the guise of an ordinary but incredibly strong man carried their ship Argo to the shores of Lake Tritonis.   Recognizing that the miraculous had taken place a sheep was offered as sacrificed by the Argonauts and Triton who had disappeared into the waters of the lake reappeared in his true form to accept their sacrifice and point them their way.   A favorite poem of my mothers was the Chambered Nautilus by Oliver Wendell Homes. It references Triton’s wreathed horn and I hear her voice when I read these final stanzas... Thanks for the he...