Curt Carpenter

Woodcut is a very restrictive art form and I find real freedom in the lack of choices. The characteristics of my woodcuts are simple, blocky, kind of primitive shapes, printed in two colors. The lack of color keeps the images more abstract, less literal, less illustrative,

maybe more formal.

 

The technique of woodcut is more like sculpture than painting. It’s reductive, not additive. Instead of adding paint to a white canvas, the printmaker starts with a black block and cuts away the wood to reveal the image. Straight lines and simple shapes are easiest to cut. The image is cut in reverse, the mirror image of the final woodcut. I print on a hand press using Japanese rice paper in additions of 25 to 50 prints.

 

—CURT CARPENTER

July 2026 | Aspen, Colorado

 

 

 

 

 

BIOGRAPHY

Born Madison, Wisconsin 1951

Resident of Aspen, Colorado

since 1979

 

EDUCATION

BS in Studio Art, University of Wisconsin, Madison, 1973

MA in Printmaking, University of Wisconsin, Madison, 1978

 

HONORS

Aspen Cultural Vibrancy Fellowship, 2023

Juror's Choice Award, Arvada Center for the Arts, "528.0," April, 2020

Aspen Art Museum Fellowship, 2020

Aspen Art Museum, "Robert Armstrong's sculpture and the Interstate Highway Sign System," 2019

 

EXHIBITIONS

2026

Aspen Chapel Gallery, "Roaring Fork Printmaking,"  Curator and Exhibitor, Aspen, CO

Aspen Art Museum, "Calligraphy Workshop" Aspen, CO

Aspen Chapel Gallery, "40 Years of art in Aspen," Aspen, CO

Anderson Ranch Artworks, Snowmass Village, CO

 

2025

Arvada Center Galleries, "Art of the State," Arvada, CO

Aspen Chapel Gallery, "Roaring Fork Printmaking,"  Curator and Exhibitor, Aspen, CO

Art Base, "Inner Workings," Basalt, CO

Aspen Chapel Gallery, "Small Wonders," Aspen, CO

Anderson Ranch Artworks, Snowmass Village, CO

Aspen Art Museum, "Calligraphy for Skiers," Aspen, CO

Art Base, "Reduction Color Linocut Class," Basalt, CO

Red Brick Art Center, "Reduction Color Linocut Class," Aspen, CO